Drabbles
by spheeris1
Summary: {multiple pairings} My little bits of writing, put together with no apparent aim...
1. Default Chapter

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairing(s): Several…read and find out…

Warnings/notes: Surreal little drabbles, originally posted at 

~~~

[Bedfellows Are Like Lemons]

Nanami wanted to be disgusted. It was right to be disgusted.  
But, instead, she felt pleased with herself.  
It had to have been all her own doing, to wake up one morning and crack the eyes open...and see Arisugawa Juri in her bed.  
Who would have guessed?  
Nanami would not have guessed it in a million years.  
But Juri was no ordinary woman, for Nanami did not consider her a *girl* by any means.   
She was all Nanami wanted to be but was afraid she would not become. Juri was the future.  
-  
It had to be a nightmare.  
Otherwise, there was no other reason for Kiryuu Nanami to be in Juri's bed. So, instead of reacting...Juri just watched the girl sleep, for she considered Nanami a mere child.  
A child who could be so destructive though. A child so aware of her own cruelty. For a moment, Juri admires the steel beyond the fashion Nanami so desires...this child doesn't even know her own potential.  
-  
'What are you doing?'  
'Undoing your top...isn't that the thing to do?'  
'Who says that is the thing to do, Nanami?'  
'I'm making the best of it. How about you do the same, Juri-sempai.'

~~~

[Train Tracks]

I used to believe that once I got out from that trap, I could easily find you. I was looking, of course, in all the right places.  
A girl screams. A child falls. A man gets shot.  
You are like Superman and I am Lois Lane.  
I am watching for someone who *looks* normal, a pink-haired girl with glasses...but I would see past that disguise.  
You'd run into the phone-booth and I would follow you into the sky...well...at least that is what I thought would happen.  
Instead, the world dances into peril and you are nowhere.  
I refuse to believe that you are really gone.  
Those swords held no power over you, those words of the past no longer haunt you...you broke free.  
-  
Cities are dirty places.  
I miss my garden. The dirt and the flowers and the worms and the bees. I miss getting topsoil on my fingers.  
I think I might settle down and buy a farm and ride horses and grow ten-foot tall sunflowers. Then, whenever I finally catch up to you...you'd have a home.  
We would have a home.   
Then I change my mind. I order an iced coffee to go and start bouncing around the streets once more.  
-  
Stupid.  
Very stupid. And I am so grateful to be stupid.  
Iced coffee in one hand, paper in the other. Not looking. Not paying attention. Traffic to and fro. People everywhere, walking as if fire licked at their heels...and me?  
An obvious roadblock.  
One impolite shove and I went sailing. The paper took off like a dove. The coffee was going to add creamy brown to my blouse...or my face, whichever was more appropo for the moment.  
But it didn't happen.   
I was suspended, eyes wide and studying the cracks of the sidewalk.  
I was saved and reeled in like a fish, steady fingers pulling me upward. And it is you, after all this time...it is you.  
'I've been looking for you...' I whisper.  
'Just waiting for you to fall, Himemiya...just waiting.' You say to me as the people keep passing us by.

~~~

[The Royal Ghost]

Millenniums ago, we were a mere family.  
With a Father and a Mother, with Brothers and Sisters, with Aunts and Uncles...too many to count...  
And you would take my tiny hand, walk me out into the cemetery and show me the dead.  
My brother. My protector in those days.   
Telling me stories of flying horses and golden towers.  
Telling me oh so many tales that slowly became oh so many lies.  
-  
'Let's go see the black marble tomb of our great-great Grandfather.' You would say and I would run to follow you.  
Running past rows and rows of cherry trees, dying white blossoms sticking to the bottom of my shoes...running to keep up with your long long legs.  
I watch you kneel and say a prayer. I say the same thing though I do not know what the words mean.  
Perhaps we are asking permission to be here? Perhaps we are sheltering ourselves from the spirits of the departed?  
And you tug me along like a doll.  
-  
One night, you left me there. I fell asleep against a tall oak as you ran away...laughing at me...playing your older brother tricks...  
And I tell myself that I was dreaming the whole time, that the things I saw that night...were not real.  
Years and years from that time, I tell myself it is not real.  
But I am telling a tale now, dear Brother. I am telling lies.  
That night, I stumbled past stone markers and past the iron gates of several tombs. Places you had not shown to me...I did see...people I did not know...I did see...  
Shadows morphed into beings, walking and disappearing in the shafts of moonlight--turning to mist before my eyes.  
Only one paused at the sight of me and dared me to continue to stare.  
And it was myself.   
My eyes looking back at me, dull and hollow. My lips smiling at me, frozen and sharp. My hair of violet, long and tangled.  
And she held your sword, Brother, she held your sword.  


~~~

[Make It Pink]

Shiori bought the flowers to remind herself of the plan at hand. Things had to be just so...things had to go off without a hitch...  
Nothing had changed.  
Not in all these years.  
Every night she dreamed of dead women dancing in tattered red gowns, every night she envisioned roses of orange wilting in the rain.  
Others forgot the past...Shiori lived in it still.  
-  
Shiori took the flowers and put them in a nice vase.  
She held it tightly as she entered the elevator, pushing the button for the twelfth floor.  
All the way up, she recalled one mental playground of perfection--Tenjou Utena.  
Juri was not perfect. She was flawed and human and real.  
Juri fell short of the ideal.  
Shiori was looking for the 'real thing'.  
So many offer it...so many think they have it...the power to change the world. The power of Revolution.  
But no, not at all. Only Utena.  
A tomboy with a heart of gold. A Prince among Princes.  
Shiori knew, after all this time, she was owed a little royal treatment.  
-  
'Found you.' Shiori said softly, sitting the vase of pink roses down and amazingly pleased that they matched her hair.  
'Do I know you?' Utena asked. How terrible, to still be living without remembering. Shiori would change that.  
The castle still stood, despite all appearances. The tower still gleamed in the noonday sun. The gate was still closed.  
'Yes, you do...'Shiori murmured, moving closer...invading personal space, sliding her hand along Utena's face.  
Beautiful and bewildered blue stared back at her. The eyes of salvation...and Shiori had no problem in taking what those eyes promised.  
Once she placed her lips upon Utena's, Shiori knew that the past would come flooding back. Specters of time would creep inside and grab hold of the two of them, racing them back to the End of the World.  
Back to their own Never-Never Land.  


~~~

[An Understanding]

There was a time when Kanae could have loved Anthy.  
She wished for a sister, when she was young and lonely and needed someone to be the other 'doll' on the playground.  
She wanted someone younger than her to take care of and shelter and teach.  
She wanted to have someone love her unconditionally.  
In between blank moments of time, spaces that Kanae can not seem to fill in, she knows that Akio does not love her.  
He could have anyone. He could have anything.  
What was this wisp of a girl to him?  
'Plain Jane' Mother called her all the time.   
Kanae knows Anthy is not plain. She is small and silent, with glasses that hide her eyes from observance. But when those eyes are open, when they stare deep into your very soul---Kanae swears that Anthy is casting some sort of voodoo.  
Kanae swears she can feel the a million needles pierce her skin, she can feel the blood slip out of her veins and pool at her feet.  
Then the moment passes. Akio watches the stars and Anthy smiles like a malevolent Mona Lisa from the shadows.  
Kanae fears that smile.  
But now, with raven petals upon her breast, Kanae understands something important...something grand and paramount.   
Kanae holds up the crumpled picture and presses it to Anthy's lips, closes her eyes in insane rapture as the seconds fly by.  
A blank moment indeed. An understanding.  
Kanae loves Anthy like she loves Akio.  
And it is hate.

~~~

[A State of Blindness]

Sometimes, she places her cold hand over her eyes and blocks out the light of the day. Underneath the chosen darkness, she can see another world.  
Neon lights flash over shiny pavement, ivory gleams like a diamond in the distance...hovering upon the horizon for a second before falling into slumber...  
She can smell honeysuckle, blue-bells, roses and marigolds.  
She can see the deep purple of the butterfly bush, the twisting vine of kudzu and the sunset orange of irises.  
She feels soft and pliant ground beneath her feet, an endless field of green in which to run or play or sleep.  
And she knows, just around the corner...just over the bend, is her family. Her mother whistling some nameless tune as she prepares a meal. Her father showering the garden with water from the lime-green hose.  
But she cannot stay there. Closer to the ivory...someone waits for her to return. She doesn't want to leave home, but the scent of something more drives her forward. The sound of pain, echoing over the atmosphere, calls to her. She can hear the sickening sound of crashing metal, she can feel the anguish of a million swords of hate, she can taste the copper of blood on her lips.  
Nearer still...she can see the face of someone she used to know.   
Nearer still...she can touch the skin so fragile and used.  
Nearer still...but not near enough.  
Sometimes, she takes her hand away from her eyes and stares out into the nothingness that is her current world. Sweat covers her brow in fear and longing for something she does not understand, something she cannot grasp...  
Something she is afraid to truly see.  


~~~

END [for now anyway…go to the lj community ^_^ ]  


  



	2. More

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

~~~

[Silent]

Miki hates the sound of nothing.  
Nothing has a way of being deafening to his delicate ears.  
It throbs with loneliness. It pulses with words not spoken.  
When the television is not on, the radio comes on. When the radio is off, the window is opened to let in the sound of traffic. When the window is closed, Miki reads aloud from his many many books.  
Miki sometimes sits at the stoop and listens to conversations as they pass by. Miki sleeps with a clock under his pillow to drift away with the constant ticking.  
[Tick, tock, tick, tock]  
He has a hazy feeling of pink sheets billowing in a summer breeze, caressing his face...like nighttime air, whipping over his skin...his eyes clouded by tears, his lungs gasping for air...his ears straining to hear piano music in the distance...  
[tick, tock, tick, tock]  
Miki talks in his sleep. He knows this because a girlfriend once told him so. She said he said names in a foreign language. She said he sang songs. She said he would fall to the floor, sobbing and digging at his skin.  
She accused him of being a junkie.  
And Miki wonders if he is one, wonders if he once took something potent and dangerous to his body...wonders if he once ran with a wild crowd, wonders if he once played Russian Roulette with the tip of a sword instead of a gun.  
[tick, tock, tick, tock]  


~

[Something About Nothing]

Anthy wears glasses though she can see just fine without them. She can see very well.  
Her eyes can study ants as they travel along a tree limb, can see the starched-white and seafoam-green of the girls uniforms from a great distance...oh yes...Anthy can see very well.  
But she wears them just the same.  
It is habit now, like so many other things.  
To get up, to eat, to drink, to sleep.  
All habitual. Not out of wanting to or caring to...just because she must. Anthy must get up from her fragrant bedsheets and leave behind a world of useless dreaming, leave that world for this world.  
This world that is a mere fantasy.  
Anthy can see the lies. They walk and talk and pretend.  
Anthy can see the pain and Anthy can see the hope.  
It hides in Utena's eyes when her Victor thinks no one is looking. It lurks in Akio's eyes when he watches the stars.  
Anthy wonders if either one sees the same when they look at her.

~

[Trouble]

I saw your lips move, but I did not hear the words.  
Maybe I didn't want to hear them.  
Not as the sun slowly slipped from the sky, charring the blue  
to burnt orange, leaving the world as we know in black.  
Too perfect of a moment, too perfect and too real and too painful...  
Your delicate hand holding onto my dangerous secret.  
My love in your palm, swinging back and forth...trying to hypnotize the truth away from my heart.  
My eyes cannot lie to you.  
And you place your hand upon me and I feel like falling and you apply pressure and I wish my skin was bare and you take something from me...you take something *from* me...something I would have given to you if you had let me.  
But you are just like trouble, just like a car crash.  
If you can't steal it, it is not worth having and if you can't control it, you want to kill it.  
I think my love is even stronger as my vision fades, watching you walk away with my heart for a weapon.

~

[Heroes Like Us]

Even as a child, Touga wanted something that was just out of his reach. That's what happens when you are used to getting everything.  
Every toy, every dessert, every curfew stripped--parental laws so easy to break...but it was never enough.  
'Never enough' becomes a running mantra in his brain, it beats in time with his pulse, it is his shadow.  
Touga knows how to play.  
Touga plays very well and Touga plays to win.  
And when he looks in the mirror, Touga sees Victory wrapping strong arms about him. It makes Touga look even more handsome, if that were possible.  
But sometimes...late at night...when Touga lets Victory slide in-between his sheets, lets Victory run deadly fingers over his pale body, lets Victory claim an unbearably common prize to gain...Touga feels hollow.  
The sensations of lust and desire grow cold. The night is no longer a hotbed of passion, just a grave--just a coffin.  
Kisses fragrant like roses, sickly sweet upon Touga's lips--and Touga returns them, languid and ghost-like...  
This is the way to untouchable things, Touga thinks as he compares lavender to crimson on white cotton.  
This is the way heroes and princes play with each other.  
And Touga knows it must be done if he wants to be one of them.  


~

[On the Floor]

I must've been dreaming.  
Because I don't remember walking into that tiny little dorm-room or snaking my arm about your waist or pulling you against me....  
In the recess of my brain, I heard you gasp--not from fear, not that at all. I heard bobby-pins hit the wooden floor, I heard zippers sliding down.  
In the eyes of a child locked away, I could see wave upon wave of purple cascade down over flesh never seen before--my skin, your skin, our skin.  
A world where red petals, soft as these lips I am kissing, fall down like rain.  
A world where I have grown too much, too fast, too far--you are undoing me, you are opening me so very wide....  
I woke up to find you on the floor, asleep and curled up on your side.  
Those clips of gold that keep your mane up, I grip them in my fist.  


~~~

END [for now…]  


  



	3. Much more

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[An Interview]

"We didn't even know someone was there till a week ago, did we dear?" The old gentleman asked his wife. She didn't answer, just nodded her head. The young girl jotted this down with a sigh. She wasn't sure why she was here, doing this story....  
"Did you talk to him?"  
The man shook his head, his weathered and wrinkled fingers fiddling with peanut shells...tossing them in a silver bucket.  
"Just one time, isn't that right?" He looked to his wife.  
She smiled over at the young girl then, eyes of blue getting vaguely glittery, shining with wetness.  
"He was very handsome..." She said softly, making her husband clear his throat. The young girl chuckled inwardly. Never too old for that it seems.  
"I just went to check the place out, like I always do...maybe pick some blackberries...and there he was. Chopping wood. Looked like he had cleared some brush back as well. Even had a horse with him, in the barn out back. Pretty little filly, all white and tall...wasn't it?" More shells hitting tin. The wife nodded once more in affirmation.  
"Is this when he talked to you?" The young girl asked, hoping to speed this along.  
"Yes. I asked him who he was and he said nothing. Just let the axe drop and hauled some wood inside. I told him that this cabin was private property, though who owns it...I don't really recall. That boy just smiled and sipped water from a canning jar." The man sort of grinned. The young girl found herself grinning back, not really sure why.  
"What did he look like?"  
"Tan skin, beautiful green eyes...and his hair...his hair was like faded violets..." The wife sighed out, her eyes now very distant. The husband cleared his throat once again and then offered the young girl a peanut. She accepted.  
"What did he say to you?"  
"Well, I followed him around a bit, just to see what he was up to. And he went into the barn, tacking up his horse....then rode him out, coming up next to me. I looked up at him..."  
The man paused in talking, his face seemingly growing younger before the young girl's very eyes. All relaxed and smooth once more. She leaned closer and waited...maybe she wasn't in such a hurry afterall.  
"I swear to you, I might sound crazy--but he looked like something out of a story-book. Like Prince Charming."  
The wife was smiling a little more broadly now, patting her husband's hand with affection.  
"I asked him again for his name and that boy looked away from me, looking out toward the dirt road there...and he said 'I'm just preparing for a wake.' That's all he said before riding off down the road."  
The young girl sat back, writing down on her notepad a little slower now. She felt oddly flushed.  
Silence fell over the house then. Her pencil scratching on paper the only sound, the couple completely quiet.  
"Uh...so that was it then...then he was gone correct?" The young girl asked, her voice very quiet.  
"Yep. Gone. And that's all we know, right?" The man nodded to his wife, standing up and taking the bucket with him. The wife reached for the young girl's arm, pulling her close.   
"Excuse me--" The girl started, but one look in the wife's eyes stalled her words.  
"He left this for you. This white rose, prettiest I've ever seen...left it on the table with a note. Just for you." The wife pressed a fragrant flower into the young girl's hand and a tiny slip of a note.  
Then she stood up and made her way into the rest of the house, the voices of the couple echoing from the kitchen.  
The young girl looked down, trying not to lose any of the petals. The scent washed over her and made her feel warm, made her feel safe. She turned the note over, running her fingers over the words.  
They all at once made no sense and then made all the sense in the world.  
They were the words she had been seeking and did not know she was in desperate need for.  
'You made it. Thank you.' it read, in pretty blue ink, delicate calligraphy.  
And Utena knew that everything had finally come full circle.  


---

[Mirage]

Juri looked from the young woman in her bed--smooth as cream skin, poured into the mold of flesh, curled up on the bed.  
One leg exposed, tangled in sheet...the slight curve of the back, the ridge of spine...all vaguely seen.  
Juri looked from this female Adonis to a tiny picture.  
She had found it yesterday, emptying out boxes as she moved into Utena's apartment.   
Juri stumbled onto this picture on the very day she had decided that her murky past was not worth the time or effort to recall.  
Juri was moving on. With Utena.  
They met six months ago. Six months ago, sharing a taxi--one of them going to the airport, the other going home.  
Neither made it to their respective destinations.  
Talks became kissing, kissing became sex, sex became love.  
Juri looks at the picture, old emotions gnawing at her bones like starving rats.  
Juri stares at the picture, willing the feelings attached to the faded image to disappear. They don't.  
And the past does not come rushing back to Juri.  
Just the ache, just the disappointment, just the wounds.  
Juri wants to hate herself for tucking the little black-and-white snapshot in between the pages of her secrets, for clinging to something she cannot go back to...especially once she realizes just who she is sharing her life with.

---

[Click, Bang, Boom]

Damp.  
Humid.  
Tense.  
Anticipation.  
That's what Utena thought of in rapid succession as she kneels down next to Anthy in the tiny enclosed garden.  
Damp due to sweat, making her uniform feel uncomfortable.  
Sweating due to the humidity in this brass greenhouse, the heat storing up painfully and thick in the non-existent air.  
Tense because Utena held her muscles tight, like moving too much might dislodge the memory hanging precariously at the edge of her mind, might cause words Utena did not understand to come off of her tongue.  
Anticipation. That one was harder to pin down. Utena felt the rush in her blood when something wonderful and new and important was about to happen. She felt her pulse race as she looked up slowly into Anthy's eyes.  
Time was suspended. It had truly stopped, just for the two of them.  
Time gave them a moment to look with wonder at the other, to feel that wondrous relief at finding the missing half of your battered soul.  
And then the door opened. Utena forgets the moment.  


---  


[Images Like Icicles]

Snow was a blanket and Nanami felt ice surround her, wrapped about her limbs in a chilly embrace.  
Frozen are his eyes, glassy and without feeling---Nanami shudders as lights blur by, as fingers dance against her skin.  
Winter came early to the campus.  
It created shadows that Nanami wanted to hide in.  
Could slips of shade cover her now that everything about her can be seen?  
And whose back-seat did she cry in? As sharp as crystalline knives, as glacial as Antarctica--Nanami is her brother's wasteland.

---

[Necrophilia]

She thinks his touches would have been cold even if his body still pumped blood to his golden heart.  
He understands her reasons, her need to scramble to the top of the hill only to fall down again--Jill must fall, so Jack can come tumbling after.  
In her mind, it was the boy rushing to save the girl.  
In his mind, it was just the way the boy was made.  
He could do nothing else but die for others.  
She peels the wings off of butterflies, presses them into her diary and talks like a piano being smashed--But he can hear her just fine.  
Her tongue dropping discord upon his lips as the world outside pushes against barriers, against this mausoleum.  
She loves that he is man enough to appreciate the beauty of the buried.  
And the kisses are dirty.  


---

END [for now…]  



	4. Much much more

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[And ChuChu Makes Three]

__

"Himemiya is... like family, I guess. When she, Chuchu, and I, the three of us are together it's kinda relaxing. We don't even have to talk to each other...." I tried to explain.  
"That makes it sound like you're a married couple with a child." Wakaba replied.   
Anthy needs my protection.  
More than I need a Prince, more than I need to be a Princess...you have to be willing to sacrifice things to protect your family...  
My family. Lost once...taken from me when I needed them the most. To shelter me, to mold me, to show me which path to take--and which to avoid.  
This family. New to me and yet...yet I cherish it as much as the first. Having Anthy depend on me, need me---perhaps Wakaba is right.  
Maybe it is more than just 'friends' after all.  
Maybe is goes beyond just family as well.  
What the three of us have, yes...ChuChu also, is something special.  
And special things are worth fighting for.

-

[Beginnings]

Just like the story, just like a ball of gold rushing to the confines of the shaded woods...only to lead you to that prince of slimly skin, that frog of false nobility...  
He was just bitter at being trapped. He didn't handle the situation well.  
Utena watched in dismay as red rubber skidded over pavement, down the hill...bouncing off of trees, into the forest.  
She knew it was wrong to go alone, but Utena was alone--and who else would get her ball?  
So, in she goes--so small against ancient oaks, using mammoth roots as steps, trying not to tread too heavily on the ground.  
A rustle above frightened her.  
The sun pierced through the leaves as she looked up, blinded for a moment...tumbling to the ground, scraping her leg and dirt on her palms.  
'Are you okay?' A small voice asked. Utena looked over, all her pain momentarily forgotten. A girl, her age it seemed, stood holding the ball.  
Utena nodded that she was fine, staring though it be rude to do so.  
'I'm Anthy.' The girl said, walking over. Utena noticed that she was barefoot. Utena noticed that her little slip of a red dress was ragged.  
'I'm Utena.'  
And the girl smiled beautifully, making Utena feel like smiling also. Utena wanted to take her home, to wash her clean and give her nicer clothes...  
'Are you alone?' Utena asked. Anthy laid the ball down in Utena's lap. She kissed the tip of her index finger and then placed it upon Utena's lips.  
'Not anymore.'  


-  


[This Story]

Utena felt like writing, so she sat down at the desk in her office. But she didn't use her computer. Or even the typewriter.  
No...this story deserved paper. From the Earth, organic and real.  
This story needed that sort of reality.  
And Utena made a few calls to a few people, people she should talk to more often and yet still avoids.  
Juri's voice was muffled, cell phone static....she told Utena that the wind was strong today, blowing sand over the deck and knocking furniture over. Shiori was holding the cat so the little thing wouldn't be afraid.  
Utena asked if she could write about some things from the past--the things all of them could not really remember.  
'If you must, you must.' Juri said, an edge of familiar steel seeping into her words. But Utena understood.  
'I'll change the names to protect the innocent...'Utena replied. _Cruelly innocent..._  
Touga was out-of-breath, pausing to drink water. He was practicing outside--same moves, over and over. His body needed a good work-out...since his accident. Saionji gave up on motorcycles after that. Touga used the guilt to get massages every night...Saionji has strong and sure hands.  
'I suppose that period of time is interesting. And we are all friends here...' Touga conceded. But Utena knew that was only partly true.  
'I won't write anything untrue...'Utena promised.  
_A man who believes in friendship is a fool..._  
At first, Miki would not take the call. But then his secretary said Utena's name...and his voice came on. He was busy, grading papers for his psychology class. And then he had a dinner to attend, black-tie of course. Kozue insisted that he take her, she bought a new dress. He would have to rush to pick her up and make it in time.  
'I hope you won't be offended if I do not buy this book.' Miki said, the sweet sound of his concern--a sound of years ago--lurking behind the words.  
'No one has to buy it, I am writing it for myself. Just a silly thing for me to do...'Utena lied.  
_A shining thing..._

First chapter became fourth became tenth.  
And still there was more to tell...always so much more.   
Utena sharpened her pencil and glanced at the clock, tiny neon red numbers telling her it was well past her bedtime.  
But she could not stop.  
The need to purge herself of this, to render the past helpless on the pages...it must be done.  
It was a journey that Utena had to finish, no matter the cost or pain or turmoil...or lack of sleep.  
After two rings, a sleepy Nanami picked up the phone. Don't you have clocks where you live? No...go back to sleep Mitsuru.  
My husband is a light sleeper, just like our daughter. She is two next week.  
'If my brother agrees to it, then I will also. Is that all?' Nanami yawned. Past the mother and wife, Utena could still catch a glimpse of the selfish little girl.  
'So sorry to wake you up...' Utena apologized.  
_Tamago, tamago..._  
Wakaba cleared her throat. Just got over the flu...been hell on classes. Studying all-night, but failing. Flying...learning to fly...Used to be so afraid of heights or of leaving the solid ground. Things are different now...so very different.  
'I remember you. You were special to me, I think.' Wakaba says quietly. And Utena wants to cry, wants to rush to her side and tell her everything.  
'And I remember you, too...'Utena whispers.  
_Onion Princess..._  
On chapter twenty-one, Utena stops. She lets the pencil drop from her hand. Smudges of lead on her fingers, slate gray against ivory...and Utena rushes out of the room.  
She runs from her house, out into the dark and damp night. The lights reflect on puddles, the cars splash by her as she runs down the sidewalk.  
The air feels good in her lungs. The wind feels glorious on her skin---like freedom, like perfection---but not.  
Not quite.   
Utena walks purposefully to the pay-phone, digging for change...it'll take a whole lot of coins to make this call.  
But all stories must end, they must shift and grow with time...as they all have, some in small ways...others in big ways.  
Anthy says hello and Utena cannot speak.  
_It's you. I know it is. I am doing well, if you want to know...if that is why you have called. I've wanted you to call for so long...is that okay to say to you? I hope so. I hope...I don't know what I am hoping for...._  
'I've missed you more than you'll ever know.' Anthy says. And it echoes the sentences running inside of Utena's heart.  
'If I asked you to come to me, would you?' Utena questions.  
_Shine together..._  
Utena fell asleep, unfinished...

-

[Sunset On Me, Sunrise Over You]

Juri won once before, though many do not remember that time.  
No one recalls that time, months and months before Tenjou Utena decided to play 'Prince'.  
But Juri can see it, clear as glass--  
_'I am your flower from this day forward.'_  
--what a joke, what a lie, what a game...  
Juri stands at the threshold of her room, her palm feels hot from touching her skin, from showing the Bride how she feels about 'miracles'--  
_'I don't believe in your powers. Do you know that?'_  
A single solitary orange petal tumbles over the silent hallway. Juri watches it run from her fingers, watches it slip away...like so many other instances, Juri cannot hold onto that which is precious to her--  
_'Isn't the sunset beautiful, Juri-sama?'_  
Hot water can never be hot enough. And Juri wishes to disappear in the steam for a moment, to not feel this agony, to not wear this chain around her neck...  
_'Are you suppose to act like this always?'_  
'I won once...' Juri reminds herself tonight, seeing a glimmer of gold in a faraway greenhouse. The Rose watering the roses, timid touches upon petals--how they became one that night, Anthy's face...*her* face...it was so easy to lose after that.  
Such a simple mistake.  
_'Does this bother you, Juri-sama?'  
'No...no, it is fine...come closer...to me...'_

-

[The Only Child]

Everyone said that Juri was always quiet in this way.  
Silent. Eyes unblinking.   
Juri would study you, figure you out and then move on.  
Did not matter that she was seven and you were fifty, did not matter one bit...  
Her father found it troublesome. Those eyes staring straight ahead in the car to school or activities. A child should be loud, running and playing, believing in silly things like giants and ghosts.  
But her mother found it amazing. Her daughter was so perceptive, so strong, so sure of herself. A woman like that is rare, much less a little girl.  
They left one morning for vacation, leaving Juri in the care of well-paid nannies. Juri read her books, then wandered the halls--to her father's study. She ran her fingers over the spines of leather-bound novels...but she was just wasting time, stalling...making sure not to get caught.  
And then, Juri opened the glass case on the wall. The chair shuddered with her unsteady footing. Juri did not care, not now that her father's sword was in her hands.  
Heavy hilt of brass, grip of wrapped leather, silver blade shining like a million stars.  
Juri had no one to share her first crush with, to gush and wax poetic like a moony romantic.  
She felt it though, a fire that burned and chilled her body.  
Power in her already slender fingers.  


-  


[Symphony]

It was not anything more than what it was.  
Just two people, connecting for a moment then splitting apart once more...just two people who have loved and lost, just two people who found some kind of strange solace in trying to remember years gone by...  
First time, it was an accident. A meeting at an art gallery, talking about Dali. Touga said the paintings reminded him of his childhood and Miki knew that feeling---_sliding clocks, stilted animals..._  
And they shared a cab, snow drifting down over the city. Touga asked him to his home, for coffee...Miki was no fool.  
But Miki followed him upstairs. He ran his fingers over the tabletop, all white and lightly engraved with roses.  
Pictures adorned the walls, under soft lighting. Touga put his hand on Miki's face...cold cold fingers...Miki smiled.  
_'Let me warm you up...'_   
Second time, it was planned. Keys jingling in locks, doors slammed...Miki needed this. Touching Touga reminded him of his loss, of his fears, of his time out of time.  
And Touga talked as he kissed, words pouring out of his lips--_I don't talk to them anymore I can't drive too fast I miss her I miss them all I wish it had never ever happened..._  
Miki liked the texture of Touga's hair.  
It was like silk.  
And Touga would chuckle before pushing Miki lightly out the door.  
Miki doesn't mind walking home alone.  
All his ghosts were laid to rest in a crimson-haired bed.

-

[Catharsis]

A car crash is beautiful to her.  
Shining metal, cracked with chipped color, dancing flames melting over stretched leather--_highway is burning_  
Those moments when you are in the air and time stops.  
Time halts and sound becomes muted.  
She cannot hear the glass shatter like her heart has done millions of times before, she cannot hear the scraping against pavement like the ringing of a million blades.  
All she can hear is glorious silence.  
She loves the sun as it splits into a rainbow through the spiderweb of windshield, she adores blue sky spinning above as this automobile turns over and over and over--_days are ending_  
She can feel her skin peel off, rich and royal blood creating a cocoon over her body, a warm shell in which she is not owned.  
Never to be claimed, never to be traded, never to be chained.  
She knows she is free as liquid floods her lungs, she knows she has escaped at the scent of charred rubber...  
Earlier that morning, Anthy got up and left her bed empty.  
She paid her bills. She sent her doves flying into the great beyond. She filled the tank and inhaled the gasoline.  
Her foot never left the petal, her eyes never wavered, her grip did not weaken.  
And no one could catch this _kuruma..........._

-

[Traditions]

__

...one...  
Saionji did not believe in himself, no matter what others might say to change his mind.  
Every morning was just another day to wake up and feel less than perfect.  
Knots in his forest of hair, smelling of oil and pine...his Mother always complained about his hair.  
Why couldn't it be straight? Why couldn't it be shorter?  
But Saionji followed his father's wishes.  
He saw the pictures on the wall of the kendo room, of samurai...his father thought samurais like gods, wise-beyond-years and bamboo for bones. His son would aspire to that type of stature--jokes and teasing aside.  
Saionji learned to grow a thick skin and to shed the hurt like a snake.  
Touga met him one day and Saionji was stuck between finding the boy silly...and then finding the boy amazing.  
His mother called Touga 'little prince' and Saionji hated that--for he believed it as well.  
Touga was something perfect. Something Saionji would never be.  
He kept the bandage for days after Touga tied it around his hand.  
Saionji held it to him as he slept, waking to find it near his lips...  
He kissed it before throwing it away.

---

END [for now…]  


  


  


  



	5. Yeseven more

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[His Army]

It could be Paris. Or Houston. Or Ontario.  
It could be the far reaches of outer-space...Anthy could never get far enough away.  
She bought tickets for airplanes, for trains, for ships.  
She drove thousands of miles on tiny back-roads that twist and turn and never end.  
She lived up in a tree. She buried herself in a foxhole.  
She changed her name, she lied about her age, she dyed her hair and wore contacts.  
Anthy wanted to be faceless to him.  
But she never can be, never ever never ever can be.....  
_sometimes she wants to die sometimes she wants to impale herself upon jagged rocks sometimes she wishes he would just hurry the fuck up and catch her and have his damn way again_  
Then Anthy wakes up, puts on her shoes and starts running once more.

-

[All-Girl Revue]

__

Nights are never normal once you've danced above the ground in a garden of slowly slipping away roses...  
At least, that is what Anthy thinks--so she prints that out and hands out flyers on the sidewalk, corner of 56th and Silverbirch.  
Most people, buttoned-up and briefcases, pass her by...ignoring the tantalizing glimpses of Indian tattoos and glancing only once at her pink-n-purple zebra hair, hanging down and loose in the breeze of a rapidly chilling November.  
_Girls can be Princes. Gender is a noose. Miracles Suck._  
Fading bumperstickers on Juri's slow-to-restore Corvette, circa 1967--a nice shade of plum. 'Plum Crazy' the dealer called it and Juri bought it without question.  
She pulled into the parking-lot, slinging long leather-clad legs out and walking quickly to the backdoor of the bar.  
She was late. But she didn't care.  
_'Clark Gable isn't Clark Gable in bed.' Sign over the door, better pay attention to it..._  
Shiori slammed her door shut, locking the various locks and then made her way outside, pausing on the stoop to light up her cigarette. Working two jobs blew--but it paid the bills, this jostling of alcohol and dancing on tabletops. And who was she kidding? She loved the eyes roaming over her barely-clothed body. It turned her on.  
_Funny how things change...now I love cats...in fact, I love all animals. Funny that._  
Nanami closed the clinic for the day, running to the nearest deli to get some food. She was always forgetting to eat lunch and now she was simply starving for some ham-on-rye, swiss cheese and mayo. She'd have to change, too...covered in dog hairs, but she loved the smell--dog breath was sometimes preferable to the breath of some of the guys she slept with. The very thought made her grin.  
_Whips. Chains. But she still couldn't afford the rack. Damn._  
Kozue practiced backstage, cutting through the air with assorted delights. She called for someone to bring her vinyl boots...she looked good in those and the crowd loved it. Ten till six--almost time. She applied red lipstick and kissed the mirror. 'God, I am gorgeous...' she thought with a grin.  
Shouts of another broken blue light, leaving her to lean against the brick wall and sigh. Long night ahead...  
_We all need a break from duty, don't we? That's how I see it._  
Utena props her feet up on the desk and closes her eyes. Soon, the show will go on and the people will love it, not knowing that every little tale told was once painful reality.  
But that is how it is...now...in this world. Utena wouldn't want it any other way.  
To go back is insane. To get trapped again is suicide.  
Utena's learned that a game or two is all part of the plan, all part of growing up.  
She picks up the phone, dialing the number and listening for a soft voice to answer.   
'Hurry back--it's about to begin.' Utena smiles and she is sure Anthy is smiling as well.

-

[Killing Tadzio]

__

...boys don't cry...  
That's what Touga told himself over and over as he rode away, shiny black car taking him past rows and rows of dying chestnut trees, to his new life--that's how his mother put it--a whole new life.   
But Touga didn't want a new life.  
Touga wanted to run away.  
_...boys shouldn't be beautiful..._  
What good were clothes if they never stay?  
Touga asked himself that question as a nanny washed him clean, rubbing his skin raw with lye soap and scalding water.  
What good was fighting if you can't keep hidden?  
Touga wondered as he was shoved into nice pants and shirt, button-up vest.  
And he couldn't cut his hair, his new father said so--his long red hair was magnificent--that's what the new father told him.  
Touga wanted to shear it off.  
And Touga was not sure he would stop with cutting the delicate locks...not with nice silver scissors so close to his pale neck.  
_...boys cannot be weak..._  
After the third time, Touga stopped fighting.  
Stopped fighting the hands gripping his arms, stopped fighting the knee pushing his legs apart, stopped struggling as his body was exposed. Touga just stopped.  
What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger--Touga had to believe that--it had to be true...it had to be true...  
It had to be.

-

[Deaf From Screaming]

She only wants her way because she never got it...that's all you have to understand about her.  
She played with the dolls you bought her, making Daddy kill Mommy so she could kill Daddy all by herself--_who took their love away from you, baby-girl?_  
She was running down by the river, trying to avoid the mud--girls aren't pretty if they get dirty and yet she found herself covered in clay--_who told you that you are stupid, sweet-angel?_  
She'd kiss you, not knowing how she learned about lips and things...then she'd shove you away, blushing her way back to the bushes--_who called you ugly, little doll?_  
And she has nightmares every night, screaming out into her dark bedroom, tearing at the sheets and running from the shadows, down the hall...but they aren't there, no one to tell her it is safe, no one to turn on the light, no one to give a damn and she keeps on screaming till her throat is raw, till she collapses on the floor and cries into the carpet--_who is going to protect you now, child?_

-

[Stealing Olives]

Before the Devil came the Prince...but what of before even him?  
Sometimes, watching fake stars in a fake sky over a fake school, Akio catches glimpses of another place, drifting in and out of the cosmic dust of lies swirling above him.  
_Groves of trees in a field and tall mountains in the distance, snowcapped even in the hottest summers...burning oak from the fireplace, tinged with the faint smell of heated black iron, mixed with herbs and spices only his mother knew about...cryptic things from foreign lands, like arrowroot and turmeric and sage and saffron...they made his stomach rumble and his nose itch..._  
Akio burned the pictures and paintings long ago, only conjuring up their images in the hours when no one in this little play was awake, not even his sister. The only art he allowed now were disturbing landscapes, their only intent to torment a certain Bride.  
_His father would stalk wild deer, bringing home dark meat--red as rich wine--to slice, to dry, to cook in stews. And his mother would make sparkling cider, cinnamon and apples and nutmeg...turning to alcohol, which he was allowed a small sip of on each birthday or holiday..._  
Akio wiped Anthy's mind clear one day. Too many times had she awakened screaming and sweating and wide-eyed in remembrance of the past, her body dancing away from the only comfort he could offer, the only comfort this new soul could give. Akio knew what she was seeing in the recess of her mind...he saw it everyday as well and also wanted to reach out to it.  
But it will always fade away, receding into the night till all you can see is black. Akio wishes he could wipe his own slate clean so easily.  
_He was only eight, trying to run in snow-drifts and pretending he was a rabbit, zig-zagging near the edge of the forest, imagining wolves chasing him as air turned to fog from his lips...he could hear his sister calling out to him, telling him that 'mama is ill, come back...' and he paused, breathing heavy...and he took even steps home, though a desperate fear gripped at his insides, into the house and to the bedroom...she was dying, he could see it in her eyes, he could see them growing dim...and she tugged him close, murmuring in a language he did not understand..._  
Akio's father did not come home one day. And he never came home ever again, only sending one letter in all that time--and it was no letter at all, just a silver ring...rose engraved crest of baby pink...Akio put it on that same day. And Akio wears it still, turns it on his finger and wishes with everything in him that he could just throw it away.

-  


[Told]

__

A knight upon horse, riding into fire and with sword drawn, only seeing the distance between themselves and their destiny...  
'It's been told before, you know'--Juri says into silence of her room.  
'Tell it again'--Shiori asks from the shadows.  
_The Prince racing up the tower steps to the imprisoned Princess, fighting off a witch and her evil minions, breaking the spell on the golden lock..._  
'Did you ever think I don't like to talk about this?'--Juri questions, ignoring fear bubbling up inside her body.  
'Did you ever think that I care?'--Shiori says with a laugh, drawing closer in the night and wrapping her arms about Juri's body.   
_Young beauty kidnapped and the dashing sailor braves storms to reach her shore, blade tasting much blood in pursuit of retrieving the girl...  
_'That was me...once...'--Juri moans, her body shaking. And Shiori holds her in a tighter grasp.  
'But I was never that pure...'--Shiori whispers.

-

[Hidden]

There is a mirror in the room and sometimes, late at night and early in the morning, Anthy stares at its flat surface. Fingers reach out and touch glass, so real that you can delude yourself that it might pull you in.  
Anthy has read that book. Alice in the Looking-Glass.  
But Anthy does not want to disappear into another false world, where reality cannot be seen and dreams become nightmares and everything morphs into unnatural colors...everything bleeds blood as black as ink in those places.  
And blood here? Varying shades of red--like wine, like crayons, like paint. And dreams here? They are painful, epic and unfinished--they have no end, no chosen path, no strings above to pull your arms and legs like a marionette.  
And reality? It cuts into you--like icy wind, like a knife, like paper sliding over the top of your finger.  
Anthy is bleeding but no one can see it.  
And only one person can stop it, but she is so far hidden in the corners and doorways and cracks that Anthy cannot find her.  
Anthy cannot find the right reality to fall into, the right dream to wake up to...she just bleeds unseen buckets of life until who she longs for comes along.  
Anthy puts the mirror in the closet.

-

[Rest/Stop]

Utena did not know how many times, in all these running years, she had stopped here--pausing to soak in bright Autumn sun or let her face be caressed by cold rain, listening to children run--sneakers on wet concrete, puddles disturbed--to motors, to wind getting split apart by metal boxes on eighteen wheels, to see red lights trail along like a wedding string stretched over time itself...mornings of vending machines, crackers with cheese and cheap can soda, evenings of cigarette smoke and grill pits, the foul stench of meat and gasoline mixing together--an oil bull, eyes burning among the trees by the edge...  
The beast stops, to snarl angrily at overweight men with shiny belt buckles.  
And so Utena stops, every once in a while, to eat and sleep and imagine a castle in the sky--before hitching a ride out along the interstate that she can never find the exit off of.

-

[Touch]

Our backdrop is always the same, night-scape spread out before us like a dark dark sheet, points of light creating Orion's Belt in the distance.  
Our fate is still the same, even now...even with lies on top of more lies, trying so hard to cover the truth with more truth, words and more words.  
But let us not talk now, both of us...watching out the window...  
Who can see us standing here, so far apart? Lips moving and sentences disappearing, see us move closer without knowing we do so...who watches us now?  
As we hold hands, as we have done millions of times before--and both of us realize it is not like before at all.

---

END [for now…]  


  


  


  


  


  


  



	6. More? Yes!

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[Getting What You Need]

You are wounded.  
You are homeless and nameless, wandering the streets from dawn to dusk...no one sees that but I.  
For their eyes, born in this world without pretense, you are ten-feet tall if you are an inch. For their eyes, you are walking upright and your pain is not noticeable.  
If you die, you die. If you live, you live. That's what they see and that is their right to see things in black and white...but not I, not this child who was stuck as a girl and is now struggling to be a woman.  
I see you crawling, crying, suffering. I see you dart around corners like a mouse...and it makes my heart shatter.  
Shame and anger are following you, watching you and you are so ready to give in, to sacrifice yourself and run away from this harsh world--but I won't let you, not this time...not this time...  
For every promise you made to me, I will now pay you back.  
For every word of love you said to me, I will now say them back to you.  
For every time you put my needs above yours, I will now put your needs above mine.  
And the sun will no longer be blinding, but warm as I envelope you and tell you that it is okay and that you saved me and that you did not fail...I thought I needed a castle once, I thought I needed a storybook Prince--but I got what I truly needed in you.  
Now you will get what you need, Utena.  
And that is a promise I will forever keep.

-

[Mother's Little Helper]

Akio knew that some had ideals of nobility, some carried the need for power over others, wanted innocence returned, wanted to be special in everyone's eyes, wanted to grow up and be strong, to be noticed, to crush someone's spirit, to hold onto someone though they are leaving, to escape pain, to coerce love from dead hearts, to cure the ill...Akio knew every wish on everyone's lips, in their hearts, in their souls.  
And he knew her deepest darkest desire, for her need was so simple--she wanted passion.  
-  
She was jealous of her daughter, of the attention her youth and body and soft blonde hair and big eyes got from gentlemen.  
And she felt no love for her husband, a means to an end--money, name, place in society. She was always told by her own mother--_marry into money, don't marry for love...love is a lie_  
And so she did.  
She did not love Akio. She just wanted him. She wanted his smell on her body, she wanted his skin to cover her own skin, she needed to feel his hands and his lips and...and...everything.  
It was obvious Kanae could not keep his interest. Though youthful, Kanae was too proper...too tame for this dark lion.  
She was not tame.  
She was on fire and ready to torch a white couch, longing to send choking smoke up into his glorious heaven above.  
_And something like that can become oh so addictive...oh so consuming..._  
'Something is burning.' She whispered in the dark, stars swirling up high.  
'It's just a dream...' Akio whispered back, but he knew better.

-

[We'll Ride Them Someday]

Everything is awkward at first, like two teacups barely hanging on the edge of a table...eager to fall to the floor, to shatter apart into a million tiny white daggers.  
_Who talks first? Who speaks the idle chit-chat? Who smiles and tries to mean it?_  
Couples pass by, hand in hand and so in love that the people the two of you used to be cringe. Romance makes the both of you shudder--for you know it all too well, the love not given, the love not received, the love never to be returned.  
_Who attempts to make up a reason? Who wants to forgive and who wants to forget? Who needs to start over again?_  
Juri must admit, after all this time, she wants to drop to her knees--as if the girl opposite her is a deity, to be worshiped and to die for--that she can kiss Shiori's heart of stone like a child's lips on a rosary.  
_Who talks in a whisper of the past? Who ignores certain names? Who asks the question that shouldn't be asked?_  
Shiori has to fight impulses, the tendril of want curling around her insides, the need to touch Juri's neck only to grip it only to break it--in the murkiness of her soul, she wants to inflict pain like an atomic bomb--agony widespread and leaving Juri's heart barren...except for her endless love, the love of a Prince for their unworthy Princess.  
_Who will walk away first? Who will cry tonight? Who will shut down once more? Who will wish that things could really change?_  
But Shiori doesn't want to be that cruel, at least not tonight.  
And Juri does not bow down, she stays in her seat.  
As they watch each other, another lifetime slips away from their hands. Another chance is blown by the wind of ancient times...but maybe someday...someday they, too, might just shine...

-

[Golden]

The place smelled of burning oak, the light smoke hanging inside of the house like a vague fog, its gray hue gathering around the edges of every room.  
And once the light of the day was let in, it illuminated the dull colors of curtains, chairs and tattered wallpaper.  
Pale yellow..._like her hair..._  
Cerulean blue..._like her eyes..._  
Footsteps creak over tarnished stairs, up into attics and bedrooms, a haven for moths...a home for the luxury-seekers of nature's kingdom. Dust rises up at each step, leaving imprints for anyone to follow like rose petals for your lover, leading you to the room for couples, ceiling fan above--a chandelier of spiderwebs.  
Large bed..._perfect for two..._  
Thick drapes..._to hide nakedness from the moon..._  
Saionji thought maybe he had lost his mind, buying this home--and as a surprise for her birthday...of all the things to do.  
But one night, she weeped in her sleep and even as he held her, Saionji felt the sadness sweep into him as well.  
The logs you use inside of yourself for a home can only stand so long under the abuse, the neglect, the storms.  
And once the window broke, both of them flew away---and ended up together.  
_'I loved him so...' She whispered that night. And Saionji understood, for he had loved 'him', too.   
'I know, I know...' Saionji said.  
'But I am in love with you. You are my home.' She kissed his chin and fell asleep._  
And Saionji conjured up this idea, for he wanted Nanami's home to be his home as well....from now on...

-

[Can You Feel It?]

Touga thinks the wind makes him gorgeous.  
Saionji doesn't care. But then Saionji claims not to feel a thing on this never-ending road to nowhere, sitting in a tiny cherry with wheels.  
And how did Touga get away with this? Getting a ride on this highway? A perk from screwing the chairman?  
Saionji doesn't want to think about **that** image too much--it bothers him for more complicated reasons than he wants to contemplate tonight.  
Touga offered a helmut to Saionji, but like always, the stubborn boy refused. Just like the photo sessions with Akio--he kept some copies, but didn't stay for afterward. Not that Touga thought about Saionji's refusal **that** often--heaven forbid friendship changed into something else without Touga wanting it to.  
_Asking if he could feel it, Saionji frowned. Yes, Saionji felt **something**--just nothing he wished to talk about. And Touga just smiled, though he was **hoping** Saionji just might feel a little more than usual..._

-

[I Am]

__

I am...  
an angel, a devil, a witch, a saint, a prince, a princess, a child, a woman, life, death, fate...who puts these puzzle-pieces together now?  
_I am..._  
wandering the world, no shoes on my feet, sand on my body, genie in a bottle--wishes to be granted...give me back my retreating castle by the unforgiving sea!  
_I am..._  
your lover, your killer, your goddess, your daughter, your salvation, your end, your beginning...god, I am everything-everything--I am your everything.  
_I am..._  
_I am..._

-

[A Message For You]

And they tied it to the leg of a pigeon, letting it fly away from their island, watching it disappear into the sky...  
_Dear Akio,  
We know you are still there. And it must be getting really dull with no Rose Bride or wannabe Prince. You must sit and look at those stars all night, without fail...and wonder how to make the hours pass quickly. But here, away from you, time goes too fast---there is never enough time to hold, to kiss, to love. How lucky you are to never know about that feeling! So, don't bother getting out. Here in the real world...well, life just happens how it is supposed to. You cannot mold it like you want to. And we like it that way.  
Signed,  
You-Know-Who [x2]_  
'Do you think it'll get there?' Utena whispered as the sun crested in the heavens. Anthy pushed the young woman back down onto the bed and grinned.  
'Even if it doesn't, he already knows what it says.'

---

END [for now…]  


  


  


  


  


  


  



	7. Drabblicious

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairing: Multiple…

---

[Ten]

****

one  
day of sleeping, wrapped up in each other, hair mingling--purple, pink, purple, pink--against the sun...  
**two**  
minutes of your hands on my back, soothing muscles and working out knots, caressing the edges and making them melt...  
**three**  
times you pull at my face, dragging nails over my back and tugging at my bottom lip--you shudder, I shudder...  
**four**  
months of self-imposed exile, nary a person in sight, hidden from the eyes of the past and the voices of the future...  
**five**  
seconds of cold water before the hot kicks in, sliding over your skin like molten lava and coating my eager fingers...  
**six**  
hours in between night and day, avoiding slumber and finding new ways to travel your body, new ways to make you moan...  
**seven**  
places to touch you that make you smile, make you tighten your hold on the bedsheets, make you whisper my name like a prayer...  
**eight**  
candles lit around the house, petals on the floor, amber light leading me closer to your embrace--how could I ever think to leave you...  
**nine**  
kisses to my spine, cold fire racing along courtesy of your tongue--press me down, create me, never ever stop...  
**ten**  
promises of love and devotion, hushed into the darkness and etched into time, tattooed upon us in red red ink.

-

[Cannonball]

I'll cut you down and rip you up and make you mine and make you beg and leave you hanging and walk away, laughing...  
Oh yes, in my dreams, this is how we play.  
And you are an ocean of my longings gone wrong--  
--I will jack-knife into you--  
Watch out below, for I have lost the need to hide.

-

[I'll Never Be]

She didn't have time these days to worry or feel left-out or to run away sobbing at things that cannot be changed.  
For today, she felt the world begin to spin anew--just for her now...just for her...  
_I loved you once, I saw the good in you...those traits that all the others could not comprehend..._  
She laughed during the day and dreamed her own dreams at night. No longer the images of pain or loneliness creeping about her brain, no longer the feelings hidden deep down--only to rush up and take over.  
_And you are so handsome, even now...even after everything, I can still see the elegance of your serious mouth..._  
She talked all through class and kissed her friends on each cheek. She ate her food in the sun, she played games with a girlish giggle, she breathed in glorious fresh air.  
_But now I understand that which I did not...that you and I would have never worked, for I am worth more than a footnote to your master plans and desires...I'll never be that type of girl, the type that settles for less than what she truly deserves. I'll never be **your** type of girl...and that is okay by me..._  
Wakaba burned the letter, not needing to really send it...merely wanting to write it, put the words down and then to let them go--like the smoke into the beautiful nighttime sky.

-

[Self]

After his hands, I wash myself--not from feelings of shame, but to start over again.  
Each morning, the hair is up.  
Each day, the water in my golden can is fresh.  
Each night, I drain off his pleasure in me, watching it swirl in my porcelain tub.  
In the hours before dawn, while he chases elusive butterflies and while students dream of growing-up and Utena reinvents the past while curled up---I step outside.  
If his eyes are watching me, I know and stay inside.  
But now, he is gone and I am free, if only for a false second or two.  
Lying in a field of my damn flowers, clothing long abandoned and skin being tickled and teased by the wilderness of velvet petals...moon shafts illuminating my fingers as they creep, not entirely out of a need to please myself, but to explore this body I do not understand and this body that I allow to be used...I sometimes touch my chest, wondering if the bright light of Dios will arise from my touch.  
All I get is gooseflesh. All I get is the imprint of my palm, the heat seeping deep into me and bringing out emotions, feelings, desires that my dear Dios would blush at.

-

[The Beautiful People]

He played piano all night at that useless bar down the street, then walked past cemeteries and sketched the tombstones in a nice white notebook.  
She danced all night with strangers, but didn't invite them home...she had bigger plans, in her bathtub and with the steam rising.  
He left his drink on the table and she pulled him forward.  
He was glad that his mind felt quiet in this moment that had been building up since before he could remember...She touched her lips to his neck, like an angelic vampire...  
Miki played jazz.  
Kozue danced the tango.  
And they buried the blender in the garden.  


-

[Pain Before Christopher]

__

Dear you who left me behind...  
Utena got the first one days later, sitting upright in bed and the clock read two in the morning and she was sweating though it was December.  
Snow was outside. Ice lined the windows.  
And Utena felt her mattress become a bed of paper, of bleeding purple ink, of bloody tears.  
_Dear you who betrayed me..._  
Anthy got the fifth one a week later, running in the park--not for health, but from fear--breaking nails against trees, shoes sliding on mud as she skids to a halt and the sky is no longer patches of gray, but of ivory-pages filling up the atmosphere, vowels dropping down in shades of pink.  
_Come back to where you belong..._  
Destiny calls fifty. Love calls a hundred.  
Eternity calls infinity--so eternity wins.  
_You know I love you like no other, my lost lover..._  
They stand at the railway station.  
They carry no luggage and they don't have tickets.  
They speak without talking, for the train to eternity   
is long...and you'll need to save your topics for a   
later date.  
Hand in hand, they disappear behind the sliding metal doors.

-

[Dragonfly]

Shiori would sometimes get up early, when dawn was just an idea in the nighttime sky, before the birds flew up and built nests, just moments after the moon was covered up by shifting clouds--  
and she would watch Juri sleep.  
Silver played over her face, normally hard and closed-off, now soft and beautiful, cuts and swatches of glittering light, like the wings of a dragonfly, covered Juri's neck and shoulders of milky-white.  
Shiori did recall a time when they were not lovers.  
Shiori did remember a place where they loved to hate each other and hated to love one another.  
Now, in a world big enough to allow discovery and wide enough to hold this kind of twisted love, this love of knots and bruises and pain--but also of devotion, compassion and the sweetest of flowers--this love of many names can feel up a room in this world.  
And Shiori must hold back from screaming, out of fear and out of joy.  
Juri sleeps on, turning to the side and reaching out for a warmth not there. Shiori returns to her pillow, pulling Juri's arm about her and breathes out evenly, breathes out like someone finally settling in to home...after years of being homeless, after years of lacking a port to sail to.  
Shiori smiles as the buzzing of nocturnal beasts lay to rest.

---

END [for now…]  


  


  


  


  


  



	8. More drabbliciousness

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[Exacting]

__

exacting roses from the body...  
Each sword that came from her body gave off heavenly light and showered the room with a petals fragrance, turned the floor into a bath of red--like her life on display, bleeding out in velvet dress and roses--each one cutting out of her flesh, piercing her chest like rocks jutting up from the sea...  
_rose...rock...roses...rocks..._  
Even through my tears, I wanted her tormented beauty to remain: living and breathing and glorious, like a flower wilting in the unforgiving sun.  


-

[Stolen]

__

where did you come from and who gave you your painful eyes?  
She was born in the desert, from a goddess--the stench of life mingling with the grains of sand--her first breath, the air of dirt, rocks and liquid fire.  
And her father kissed her on the forehead, placing a red jewel, a tiny dot, a mark to bear through all of time on her forehead--he placed it with the tip of his tongue.  
And so she was alive.  
_why do you suffer so and what is behind your fearful heart?_  
So the story goes, living in a temple of marble and clouds, that she wandered away one day, lost forever to a storm, swirling tan taking her away from her homeland--her mother cried to her death, her father rode his horse into the wastelands--all because their princess was gone.  
_how did you come to be here?_  
Out of their grief, they created a son. And sent him to search for her, but bitterness became his cloak and once he found the princess, her fate was sealed...just like before...  
He kissed her forehead, but did not stop there.  
And the princess believed him when he said that her mother and father did not love her, did not need her, did not want her.  
_that is how witches are born..._

-

[Burning Down the House]

Dearest Kozue,  
I am living in Paris now. And I cannot sleep well...I think I became addicted to those milkshakes, to the sugar and now...now I stay up because I miss the sugar.   
Or maybe not that at all, maybe something else all together.  
Yes. Sometimes, I miss sharing a room with you.  
Listening to you slip off your uniform or back-talk me or sneer at me...I can hear that sneer, you know. Your disdain makes more noise than any drunk Parisian jazz band.  
And I write some songs now, too....Maybe you'll hear some of them, if you come over--if you get this letter.  
Perhaps you'll just throw it away like you did with the ones from our parents. They write me now. The letters come here, rose-scented from Father. I don't read them--I am like you now, I think.  
I think I like to be reckless now, just a little wild like you now. Do you find this funny? I bet you do. I can just see your impish and devilish grin.  
Anyway, my coffee is getting cold and the sun is setting..I can't see to write more. I have no electricity.  
Paris is pretty this way. You should see it some time.  
Yours,  
M.

-

[City of Lights]

'How long have you been here?' She asked, sipping her coffee and letting an old man sketch her face. She had no reason to hide anymore. The old man said she smelled like a rose-garden. She just smiled at him.  
'Five years.' He told her, jotting down notes on his composition paper with a sliver of charcoal--the brittleness of it appealed to him greatly.  
'You must like it.' She responded, dropping gold and silver coins into the old man's hand. He gave her the picture, all wine-soaked shading--orange merging with green with blue with pink--she liked it, but not enough to keep it.  
'I do. You should think about staying here.' He suggested, scribbling B-flats and marking out times. He could hear the shouts above in French, his ears trying to catch some words he understood.  
'Do you ever want to go back?' Juri asks, reaching over and gently pushing Miki's music down to the table. Miki smiles a little.  
'Yes and no. It is the 'no' I listen to.'  
Juri smiles back, returning to her coffee.  
Maybe she would stay here...at least for a little while...  


-

[Untitled]

__

unimaginable connections---  
When Shiori saw her walking, it made her skin burn--as if someone was holding matches to her body, as if Shiori was flying toward the sun with wings of wax--Juri is the sun.  
And Shiori is nothing more than coal on the ground, buried under shoes and soil.  
Shiori cannot grow underground, so she festers like a wound and spreads her kissable disease, from her lips to someone else's lips from their lips to someone's ear from their ear to Juri's ear....Shiori has connections like that, when she uses them to hurt someone...  
_unseen, shining edges..._  
Juri has seen her eyes, so wide and beautiful, open like a window and colorful like a plum...only to see them become hard and cold, shuttered off like a safe and sharp like unfinished stone...no one tumbles those jewels, though Juri wants to, wants to take the need in those eyes and polish it back to youthful perfection.  
Juri can feel Shiori's fingers though they have never even touched, her nails like knives and cutting off more and more pieces of Juri's heart, unseen to the naked eye...unseen but oh so real...

-

[Games of War]

All his moves were planned, from the beginning and to the end, all the evidence was shredded and all the witnesses bought, slept with--any means necessary, all is fair in love and war...  
The heat of his phone in his pocket, ringing all day and all night--_rockets going off_  
The stares around the campus, eyes undressing him--_bullets grazing the skin_  
His body is a chessboard, pawn to E4--mouth to torso--  
and he will forgo all the foreplay, who needs it? The engine is always revving up and racing down the highway of dreams for him...and he is not blinded by love or friendship or family, not like the rest--_a general under pressure_  
Akio says he is hoping for him to win this little war of the roses, this battle for eternity--and Touga is willing to forsake more than honor to get there...in the end...he is willing to sell it all down the river--_soldier under fire_

-

[Catastrophes In Waiting]

__

'Without love there are no dreams.'  
Utena heard this whispered one night, next to her ear in the hours for sleeping, and she awoke--looking to the side, seeing Anthy's bed empty.  
But it has been empty before...though Utena doesn't really know how often it has happened...could be once or could be a million times...  
_'Without love..._  
This time it was louder, from the kitchen and Utena got up slowly, walking as if this was not her room and she should not be here...edging her way to the door and pushing it open. Anthy sat on the floor, knees tucked under and arms crossed tightly.  
'Himemiya...?' Utena asked, but she received no answer, even as she knelt down and crawled closer, even as she touched Anthy's cold face--no reaction.  
_...there are no dreams..._  
Anthy said softly, letting her body crumble sideways and into Utena's quick-moving arms. And she held Anthy there, listened to the girl say that one line over and over and over...till Utena felt disoriented, dizzy and found herself kissing Anthy's mouth, muttering words of comfort and reassurance.  
'You have love, my love and you'll have dreams to come true, because I love you and you'll be safe now, don't worry...don't get upset...I am here, I am here...' Utena couldn't stop, as if watching from a distance at her kissing Anthy, talking to Anthy and holding Anthy close....  
'Utena-sama?' Anthy questioned and Utena bolted up, a stab of pain shooting up her back and into her neck. Why was she in the kitchen? Did she sleep here?  
'Himemiya...' Utena mumbled quietly, letting the girl help her up and back to her room.  
'Go to sleep, Utena-sama.' Anthy whispered, going to her own bed.  
And Utena fell asleep, with Anthy wondering how Utena came to be sleeping in the kitchen and why she found herself waking up in Utena's bed?

-

[A Pretty Passage]

Her steps felt uneven, with pavement missing in some places and dips in the road, the faded double yellow lines running off into nowhere.  
And she walked. And her legs burned with the exercise, with the motions she is not used to--back and forth, strings stretching and muscles pumping--but she did not stop.  
Her blood sang out, it rose up and colored her cheeks, it made her glow like a pink sunset over the sea.  
She drank from cactus, nicking her fingers as she cut into the tender flesh of green and sucked out the hidden bounty of water--she watched rabbits run over the ground, she followed vultures as they circled carrion below--she was not living off the land, she *was* the land.  
It pulsed around her, within her and it sustained her as days became months and months became years..._but not really.....  
...she woke up outside the gate and saw only darkness behind her, only darkness ahead. Was nothing different out here in the real world? Did she run and fight for nothing? Was her changing and growing-up for *nothing*?_  
And a rabbit runs past her, tiny feet kicking up dust and heading west.   
_As good a direction as any, Nanami decides and begins to run after the universe now open to her._

-

[Six Ways To Leave You]

__

Kill him. Run from him. Hide from him. Disguise. Duel. Die.  
Anthy has thought of them all, laying in silence on his couch and with her head pillowed in his lap, drifting in-between waking and dreaming--  
But how do you kill that which only takes what is offered to them? How can you hate those who use you because you let them?  
And Anthy marks off each one, none of them worthy enough to be tried...until the last one--the one she always comes back to, the one that she is destined for it seems.  
_To die. To let her life dissolve like sugar in water for his life to go on..._  
He brushes her hair back softly, like he truly cares...and maybe he does, deep down somewhere--past the need for eternity, there lies a brother buried and he loves his sister, he wants her to hold and to cherish and to love--That brother wants her to be saved one day.  
But Anthy tells him that she cannot be saved, not now and not ever...and she curls her fingers into the material of Akio's shirt, tugging it open like she has done for years and years and he leans down to kiss her mouth, tasting of bitter acceptance...

-

[Easier This Way]

Looking for a Prince is hard, traveling the world's surface and eyes becoming bleary--it takes a toll on you...  
But this is easy, this is simple and understood--it makes sense the way snow in June makes sense...at least in Alaska...or somewhere...Anthy thinks these things, laying in her bed with pale legs wrapped around her and crescent moon indentions on her arm from Kozue's nails.  
Kozue sleeps all day and kisses all night, Kozue doesn't pretend life is grand now, out here in reality--it is what it is....just life with more possibilities, like this one. At Ohtori, the two of them had a common bond and a speeding car...here, the two of them are adrift and searching, finding a bit of home in the heat of their mutual embrace...  
Anthy presses herself flat to the bed and lets a waterfall pour over her from Kozue's skin--they decided to wait one more day to begin the long road to redemption...

-

[The Over and Under of It]

__

When did her delicate fingers turn to fists, hard as cold iron and slamming down onto the surface, breaking the shell open?  
Kanae went to therapy twice a week, coming out of fugue-like states mumbling and chattering about a room with no windows.  
'Can you tell me more?' The therapist asked.  
'Yes, but I don't want to talk about it.'  
-  
_Blonde like corn-silk, up against sickly skin and pale pink lipstick--kisses in moonlight and bitter fruit by day--who led you to the hanging tree?_  
'You have to want to explore these images...' Her therapist started in. Same as always...same words, same demands.  
'I see a scarf. That's all. A scarf of silk, tied around my neck and it keeps getting tighter...is that what you want to hear me say?' Kanae feels frightened and angry.  
'Is the scarf real?'  
But Kanae does not answer that question.  
-  
_Gifts from a lover, husband to be and held so firmly to her chest, to feel her heart beat with a useless love and pathetic devotion...a fabric to last till the end of time..._  
Kanae let the scarf fall to the desk.  
'All real. Told you so...it was all real...' Kanae hissed, then walked out, leaving the garment with this shrink who knew nothing of pain or lies or anything.  
Kanae knew about those things, like she knew her name or her eye-color. Kanae knew so much more than she was given credit for--she lived with the Devil in his harem of the dead, nearly letting that show of elegance choke her into oblivion--then she woke up on the outside of it, under it, over it.  
Kanae didn't need to pay money to realize that.

---

END [for now…]  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  



	9. yea you know the drill by now

Drabble

By spheeris1

Pairing: multiple…

---

[Before]

In her dreams, she was chased by the deadly pictures of her future--running across floating platforms, soft flowers the color of a raven, mindless on top of the world--but now, in the happiness of a place that made perfect sense, Kanae let the warmth of this time wrap her up like a pair of secure arms...a lover, completely devoted to her, always in her heart and in her bed and in her hands...this lover took no face, neither male nor female, just there--a form without demanding and a love without bruising--Kanae lived her life like a shy debutante, walking down flights of marble stairs and cowering in the spotlight...eyes of her family, her friends expecting her to pose and posture and preen. Kanae wanted to run to the confines of her room, fall into leather-bound books or the watercolored images of old movies...she wanted to be in the black dress, dancing in the water fountain--free and sexual and confident--La Dolce Vita burning in her soul, barefoot on the sand of a million beaches throughout time eternal...  
Kanae wanted to disappear.  
Kanae wanted to set herself aflame with passion.  
Kanae wanted to see the world through the eyes of a stranger.  
To escape her mother's glare, her father's absence, her friends little games of dolls and houses--when would she ever be able to grow up and flee to the end of this world?

-

[Adults Don't Play]

Accidents happen every day...or so Miki tells himself as his car goes careening off the rain-slicked highway, the hood of supposed strong metal pushed upward like tin-foil by a tree trunk, the horn continuing to blare out like some demented warning signal--_everyone, stay calm! no need to panic!_  
And so Miki stayed calm, his logical brain that has spent years figuring and tinkering tells him to remain sedate now that he is bleeding on the steering wheel, dying on the side of the road.  
_...and remembering two days earlier, like a film reel shown in reverse..._  
They talked about music. Then compared stopwatches, both of them somewhat shy and nervous. Talking of the past does that to people sometimes--it makes their skin crawl, as if someone is walking over their pre-destined graves.  
And they talked late into the night, into the morning and Miki fell asleep. Very rude of him to drop off like that with a guest...but all things work out the way they should.  
Miki awoke to find a head cushioned on his chest, hayseed gold hair and a hand splayed out over Miki's cotton t-shirt, nice and long fingers, perfect for playing a piano...  
_always comes back to that, the contrast of black and white, the contrast of two bodies against each other, the contrast of desire and desperation..._  
Miki felt his heart pounding throughout his body, thrumming with his life force and pouring it out like syrup onto his knees, his legs, his feet.  
The windshield wipers moved back and forth, keeping in time with his erratic heartbeat. One, two...one, two...  
Or 3/4 time. Or 4/4. Notes of his life scribbled down in blood.  
_this is the world of grown-ups and the world where no one lives forever--here, there is no such thing as eternity._  
One day, Miki walked into a bookstore. And two hands reached for the same book, two voices apologized, two people suddenly recognized each other.   
And the fingers stayed together longer than they should have.  
'Do you still play the piano?' Mitsuru asked once, ever so softly. Miki turned the light off.  
'That was when I was a child...I am an adult now. Adults don't play.'

-

[Hang It On You]

__

His hands, those of a warlock and a lover, put this curse on me that I put on you and you, in turn, take these malicious words into your heart, turning them into a war...  
For once, it was not a planned thing. No strings that cannot be seen, pulling Anthy's arms one way and her legs another--a rope wrapped around her heart and forcing blood to move into her veins, forcing her to breathe and keep living though she might not want to...not this time, this time was simply **this time**.  
Kanae, tumbling off of the Black Rose like a junkie dissolving from a hit, dropping to the floor and screaming--attacking shadows and fighting off invisible dangers--Anthy found her so unbearably delicate in that moment.  
So easy to break, so easy to harm. Akio does that most times...and Anthy felt a sudden need to do the same.  
Anthy tells herself that she does not hate Kanae, only herself for not being strong enough to break free and fly away--and Kanae is there, demented and rambling, a beautiful mess of a girl--easy to take from, easy to rip solace from...and Anthy needs some comfort, a kind her brother can never ever give her, going beyond physical...going beyond love or devotion...it is the kind this little golden bird can give to one tortured purple plume--a royal peacock in heat--  
_Be a star..._  
Anthy pulls her upward and looks into her wild eyes, eyes filled with pain and confusion. She takes time with buttons of a dead uniform. She weaves her fingers through sweaty hair of blonde.  
_Be an altar..._  
Anthy loves the feeling of her cold skin and her shuddering breath and her sharp nails. If Kanae fights, it is in her own twisted up mind. If Kanae struggles against this, it is too silent for Anthy to hear.  
But then, right now, Anthy does not care.  
_And I will hang it on you..._  
Every place on her is soft to touch, every inch tastes like rich cream...and Anthy consumes as if starved, taking control over this body so like her own and yet so unlike it...they are both trapped in cages, both used and abused and somehow live for the punishment...Kanae's eyes gather clarity near the end, as her body rises up and accepts a wave of ecstasy--Anthy kisses her before leaving, candles lighting up as she goes.

-

[And Heaven Above Us]

Funny how dreams can get ripped away...  
_lights dancing spinning flashing and i see you there standing arms open and you say you'll love me till the end of time till the end of eternity till the end of everything and i cry because i've never heard those words before...and they are the only words i've ever wanted to hear_  
...and funny how devils are beautiful and angels are deceptive...  
_awaken in me this princess and kiss her lips and touch her virgin skin and grip her hand and make her mysterious body known--a land discovered and traveled upon, a place of dips and valleys and planes--and tell her that losing a country is worth it, losing a sense of self is all worth it_  
...and funny that I can see heaven above us, twinkling in the endless sky, beckoning me closer with every single lie...

-

[Freedom]

__

Rose, trying, working, to show itself...  
And Utena could hear it somewhere, past the spinning tires and burning metal and engine roar--she could hear the glass shatter and the walls fall down--she could feel her body grow hot, running too fast on dark pavement, her blood turned to fuel and her face becoming chrome...and Utena was racing against time itself, bracing for the inevitable slam of brakes--but they never came--only she came forward, pushing past sound and eternity, working around giants of rubber and giants of the past, carrying one but driving for two...each burning headlight, a rose of white...a Prince is escaping with the girl from the tower...Utena became Utena when the covering of pink slipped from her naked skin, revealing the real world upon her body and Anthy became Anthy as the wind of change stripped her body of that harmful bodice and the landscape shifted to allow them passage to the world beyond, to a place two roses can grow free...

-

[Unnecessary]

__

...explanations will fall flat, you know...they don't matter now, not with the castle falling and a chained Prince once again hopping onto his steed and a fallen Prince shaking in fear_...the how and the why and the who do not matter anymore, you know..._those swords of hate, those weapons used to kill and cage--they are useless now, they cannot hurt anyone now--and all the clocks have stopped, time is meaningless in this moment_...that pain will fade away and that love will grow, you know..._fingers reaching for each other, struggling past unnatural hindrance and desperate for purchase--years and years, waiting to find this perfect hold_...speaking is not necessary with us, you know..._for a brief second, bliss is known before being stripped away and the only thought that can live after-wards is how all of this is so very _unnecessary..._  


-

[A Cut Above]

She pulls the string and waits around the corner...tug, tug and tug--toy, toy and toy...and that slithering snake of gold creates a path from her hand to Juri's miserable heart.  
_Fresh---_  
Those eyes are watching every move, stalking and lurking and stepping in the same places--polished brown leather shoes following, trailing like a blood-hound and yet there for the kill alone.  
_Unique---_  
And at night, charcoal blackness to cover her body skirting by the wall and to Juri's room, to listen to tortured sleeping and anguished dreams...and Shiori pulls back the blankets, placing thousands of orange rose petals on the sheets and pillows, over Juri's silk-covered body...'sweet-scented nightmares tonight, my love'...waking to be stained by the cruel sun...  
_This flower is a cut above the rest..._  
Juri awakens, skin cold and clutching her locket.  
Shiori sleeps with the peace of the dead.

-

[End]

We've grown old and my time has ended and your time is ending--we can love fate for not tearing us apart ever again--it is letting us go together into another new world, another plane of existence, another realm to discover///  
_take my hand and don't be afraid, don't be afraid of the world where we will meet..._  
and you've seen the land, the sea, the sky and I've led myself along paths I never thought I would go down and we've watched the seasons come and go and come and go--each night, your hand in mine, like the past but oh so much better this time///  
_I've come all this way just to meet you...just to see you..._  
and I watch you slip away, a glittering star rising up and sparkling, I watch you ascend and spread out and I watch you become one with the universe and I know I will join you once again, for we are part of each other--till the end of time, we are meant to be, forever and ever and ever///  
_someday someday someday someday..............  
..........we'll shine...........together............._

-

[Within/Without]

Juri didn't want to be a prince, but it came naturally--like walking and talking, like independence and strength, like devotion and desire--the sword was in her hands from the day of her birth, the flower was placed upon her breast as she first opened her eyes.  
Juri didn't want to be a prince, but she was one--she lived for nobility and she suffered torment--and even princes must fall sometimes, despite their best efforts...they stumble over the emotions of others, of their own heart...when they hit the ground, the whole world shakes.  
Juri didn't want to be a prince, but she couldn't help it--watching tiny girls disappear due to foolish whims, watching *one* tiny girl disappear into the oblivion called hate--sometimes a prince cannot save the damsel, sometimes a prince can only save themselves...and they live with the shame always and always, wearing it 'round their royal necks.  
Juri didn't want to be a prince, but then she was not the only one--others came before, others follow behind--soldiers marching with no destination in sight, only the taste of distant victory on their lips and kisses of princesses to send them along...and they all knew they would die, they knew that they would never ever get to come home.  
Juri..._broke free and ran_...didn't..._want to be a slave to a fantasy_...want to be..._alive and happy and content_...a prince..._can live outside the castle, can just be human_...  
But Juri is a prince, inside and out, within and without......  
....in this world and that world....  
.........for eternity...............

-

[Garden of Eden]

__

just like a dream, you come to me...  
More hands than just one person and fingers like feathers over differing shades of skin, crickets in the distance and breeze through the leaves, nighttime pierced by fireflies and gasps and anguished cries--not of agony--but of release...letting go of hate and pain and fear, replacing those hollow tombs with the honeyed air of pleasure...  
_and i do not know of your realness, only of your touches..._  
Tanned brown under ivory white and overlapped with creamy blonde, covered by the faint shimmer of gold-orange--no roses can compare to living and breathing flowers--the vines pull tight around them, shielding them from even this imaginary worlds eyes, protecting them even as they beg for less than gentle caresses...  
_and i do not know of your love, only of your lips against mine..._  
Kingdoms are shattered now, the stones of temples and towers tumbling as each cry echoes out, the walls of Jericho torn asunder not by trumpets, but by the aching moans of each girl--butterflies taking flight on the shimmering flutter of want and need mixed with despair and fear--a scent more potent than any musky perfume coating the glass of this cage...

-

[Blood Like Water]

__

It doesn't matter what I want   
That is what she tells herself, looking over her outfit and her hair, every day...every morning. All the things she wants, she can get with the tiniest turn of her wrist.  
Except for this, except for **this**.  
And it matters, but she'll pretend that it does not.  
_It doesn't matter if I cry_   
That is what she thinks, watching the games he plays and thinking back to a time when it was them alone in the world--no fawning girls or duels....she had found eternity back then, with him...only with him. But she refuses to sob like a little girl for something long gone--but she wishes she could.  
_Don't matter if I bleed_   
That is what she reminds herself of, whether a small child running from cruelty or a young woman running with swords, her life is meaningless without his presence in it. And she feels utterly **meaningless** now...always away, always sleeping somewhere new, always lying and deceiving...can't he see? Can't he see that without each other they are nothing at all?  
_Feel the sting of tears   
Falling on this face you've loved for years_  
She does not know if this sadness is from losing him or that she never had him. She does not need to see pictures of the past, to mock her or to beg her to return. All she needs is those words from his lips, the ones that tell her that despite the changing of time and people and places---it is still just them, together...always...

-

[Jumped]

__

/It was not something she was proud of/  
Wandering streets late at night, steps slowing down outside this non de-script building...like all the others, but hiding something **quite** unlike all the others...inside brick and plaster, beyond varnished wood and seductive red curtains lives a soiled dove--a killer concubine--and she knows the power of rose petals on certain customers.  
_/but she goes anyway for she cannot help herself/_  
Ground up and burning like incense, wafting out into the darkness and pulling her in--just like that, just like that--her feet move without her consent...that's the way she likes it these days...up the stairs, into the room, watching from the wall--tortured gorgeous tangerine wallflower--watching thighs like moth wings open to the candlelight.  
_/and this is a future she did not foresee/_  
Touching a pulse point and feeling it throb like blood pumping, each heartbeat echoed in chest and neck, they've done this before--many, many times before--and who knows how many times in the past, covering it over with miracles and jealously, did they merely want to take from each other something they so needed...  
Shiori loves this, she is the master and Juri the servant, but she does not have to scratch and claw her way to satisfaction--Juri gives it willingly, each time she comes, she gives a part of herself over to Shiori's mouth and Shiori devours it...  
Juri walks away hours later, but in reality, she has never ever left that bed of tattered sheets--and she never ever will.

---

END [for now…]  


  


  
  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  



	10. moremuch more

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[Glass Slippers Shatter]

__

slice off the fingers...  
And she was lost, but on purpose, deep inside the forest--that place forbidden to her, yet she wanted to enter into its folds--long fingers trailing over the apple skin...rich red and enticing, like all things under the shade of these trees--all things held hidden treasures.  
_...and slice off the toes..._  
Distant horses clatter, coming to carry her away from hay-stuffed beds and dusty table-tops, away from that grove beyond that she so held dear...but whispers in the wood speak of her, they talk of her present journey to Hell and of how easily angels are seduced from the sky.  
_...and let your eyes begin to bleed..._  
She thought she was dancing, but it was really an illusion--this party, held in arms unknown, music like the sound of cannon-fire--is she dreaming or is there a war outside? Is she merely dizzy or did her Prince put something in that punch?  
Did she forsake her thorn-covered womb for the delights of a marble tomb?  
_...and watch those glass slippers shatter..._

-

[Love]

__

she is neither pink nor pale,  
and she never will be all mine;  
she learned her hands in a fairy-tale,  
and her mouth on a valentine.  
All those pictures on the wall do not begin to capture you, standing before me and unraveling before me, letting the true form behind that shadow show and gently taking my hand in yours....you show me the realness of your skin, the reality of your curves and your slopes....and the enormity of this moment could swallow me up, spit me out and leave me for dead--if not for your eyes on mine, beckoning me forward and to your mouth...how many do you kiss at night? Many more than I ever have, surely---but as sure of this as I am, I am even more aware of you against me now, of your heart--your heart, so very alive--beating in time with mine...  
and I rush to keep you with me, to save us both from the turntable of time and the swell of ancient waters--you are as unreal as you seem and still more real than I can ever hope to be....will you depart with me?  
Will you be mine?

-

[Babylon]

She was standing at the intersection, waiting for the light to change and the tiny red unisex person to motion for 'walking' not 'stopping'.  
She was dangling her purse from her fingertips.  
She had no umbrella even though the sky was a dark grey and distant thunder played like timpani drums above.  
She breathed out once---then held the air inside of her, air of smoke and sticky candy and red nail polish--air of a little slip of a girl, two blocks away and lounging on a bed, two blocks away and walking in plain view with no clothing, two blocks away...too far away...too damn far away...  
///  
Kanae met her three weeks ago.  
And she didn't know her impish face from Adam. But this girl knew her...or claimed to anyway. And she brought up things that Kanae didn't want to hear or remember or feel.  
This 'Kozue'. This 'girl'.  
But Kanae met up with her again. And again. And again.  
Until the straw was laid down and the camel crumbled to the desert--Kanae snapped with the memories Kozue was forcing, the images of agony stored in Kanae's mind and that Kozue laughed at--and Kanae slammed her into a wall.  
_'Do it...' Kozue whispered.  
'I want to kill you, I want to kill *all* of you...' Kanae hissed. And Kozue smiled slowly, so slow and soft that Kanae felt some part of her insides suddenly break open and spread wide once more. That's when Kozue decided to kiss her. And that is when Kanae decided to kiss her back_  
///  
She didn't think she was like this.  
Selfish. Demanding. Needy. Kinky.  
But she is...they are...the whole stupid world is...  
Kozue insists on being as cold as possible and she wants her picture of a boy who looks just like her to sit on the bedside table, to watch them under the freezer sheets of Kozue's chambers.  
And Kanae should feel something other than the hot spinning of lust in her gut at this....but she does not.

-

[Stopping]

She didn't know when she started to feel like this.  
Like the world she knew was hollow and the time spent there was meaningless.  
And if she asked herself honestly, didn't she just want to die?  
Didn't she want those swords of hate that she so richly deserved to cut her open and let her bleed out?  
Each point was driven in by her words, each cut was that more painful due to her actions.  
So, in essence, her eternal punishment is to **not** die, but to feel so completely dead.  
No...no, she does not know when she began to feel this way about her life--her life of being a corpse in the hands of her own self-hatred.  
"Are you ready, Anthy?" Akio asks.   
"Of course, dear brother." Anthy replies.

-

[The World Is Not Enough]

They sometimes talked.  
It could be daytime outside of that silent place where the true prince slept...Akio didn't know.  
Akio was always living in the night anyway. He could never adjust to the sunlight.  
But when they talked, only Akio's lips moved.  
Dios said a lot of things...just without words. All the things he needed to get across came from his shadowed eyes--hollow and dark places on his skull, blind like fish in a cave.  
Akio brushed aside the boy's hair and kissed his forehead, feeling Dios press against his lips...  
"If only you would understand me. We could have the world if we were together once again." Akio whispered.  
Dios tightened his hold on Akio's arm, but said nothing.  
He did not have to.

-

[Special]

At the end of the day, they just had one thing in common---and it was the very thing that kept them apart.  
Shiori used to look at Juri, in her youth, and see someone beyond her vision. Too good, too perfect, too much of everything Shiori could never be.  
Juri used to look at Shiori, in her locket, and see someone beyond her heart. Too innocent, too pure, too much of everything Juri did not deserve.  
But the roses no longer tint the gaze and the past does not die, it grows into a beast of burden--standing in the room like a bull in a china shop.  
Juri falls from the pedestal and Shiori wallows in the mud.

-

[Undone]

Saionji can hear the wheels on the ground and feel each breath Touga inhales, pushing against Touga's ribs and into Saionji's back. And he watches the sun die over the horizon, knowing everything is changing--for better or worse, Saionji does not know--but by tomorrow morning, the whole world will be different for the two of them.  
Saionji knows that is why they ride now, back to back on a bicycle not built for two--not like years ago, when they perhaps fit together well....Touga's hair gets tangled in Saionji's hair one last time, before they must let go and grow up.

-

[Swept Away]

Utena awoke from a reoccurring nightmare, her body trembling and her skin covered in sweat.  
Three in the morning.  
She had slept two hours.  
And she could hear the paper slipping through her mail-slot on her front door, letter after letter after letter...all addressed to her...  
But Utena had no idea who they came from.  
Where they came from.  
If Utena was being truthful, she was not even sure where *she* came from.  
Birth certificate says the place, the time, the day--but Utena isn't sure if that is all or not.  
First letter says 'come and find me'  
Second letter says 'I am waiting'  
And so on and so forth--all from a place called Ohtori, always smelling of roses. Utena crushes them without thinking, pain pricking along her arms--then she sweeps them away, into the trash.  
But they keep coming--begging, pleading, nagging.  
'Who are you?' Utena asks the mirror, staring into her own eyes and holding the last note of the day in her fingers--the paper shrinks down, forming to her finger and becomes a ring.

-

[A Time For All Things]

No one saw what she saw that day, walking home from school. A crisp Autumn day, the leaves covering the road and crunching under her feet.  
Kanae carried her books in her arms.   
Kanae thought about equations and romantic literature.  
Kanae saw the sky grow dark with impending night.  
And then, quick as a flash, someone darted around the corner--a little girl of brown skin--Kanae swore for years and years to come that something...or someone...was chasing that little girl.  
Kanae dropped the books and ran after the girl, a wild impulsive force taking over her body, turning her normally weak bones into steel.   
But the little girl was gone, the street empty as always at this time of the evening.  
Kanae looked to the ground and saw, hidden within a sea of dust, bright red rose petals. They made a trail, a trail Kanae followed--forgetting her books or going home--and led her to see something no one else saw that day.  
A girl up in the air, skewered by swords and a mournful prince in white.   
'One day...you will have your chance...' The prince said.  
Kanae ended up home once more, not knowing how she got there. And a rose laid on her bed, but she did not know where it came from. And a ring lingered on her vanity table that she had never seen, never worn...  
Kanae was sure she was forgetting something vastly important.

-

[Lipstick Boy]

After the first six years or so, the mirror in the hall did not record his face aging--it kept track of his hair, those locks of the deepest blue--down to his shoulders now.  
It was not messy on purpose, it just laid that way.  
It fell into his eyes as he wrote.  
And that mirror, as night came and became the dusk of morning, while all others slept or continued to mingle....he caught a glimpse of his lips in the light, reflected onto one-way glass.  
The prettiest shade of red, glimmering with alcohol sheen and full with stolen drunk kisses.  
He had become a beautiful boy, no need for make-up on his cheekbones or lipstick upon his mouth.  
He was gorgeous in the hours before and the time after.

-

[You, Me And Venus]

And the even darker, accurate, rose of sex....that he now knows of her, peeled back and revealed. And she remembers the cold metal, smooth against her naked skin and the licks of fire from his touch. She can still see the stars above, his name twinkling in the sky--but she forgot her own name laying upon the ground, as carelessly discarded as her dress...that name fades away with his kiss.

-

[First & Last]

You are kissing me and I am kissing you.  
Something so simple, so much a part of some world we do not yet know of. I want to memorize the flavor of you, just in case this is the end, just in case we are going to go up in flames instead of break free. I want my last touch to be upon your skin, my last vision of your eyes. I want the final sensation to be love overwhelming, love overpowering, love all-consuming in my veins. You are kissing me and it might as well be the first time I've ever been breached this way---and if it is all over for you and I, then it might as well be the last.

-

[Don't Ask]

Nanami thought by the light coming in through the window that it must be midday. All of a Sunday spent in bed was bad for muscle-tone. She normally did not think this way, but then she had been around Juri too much these days.  
Five a.m. work-outs. Healthy meals.  
Of course, Juri was asleep now. Her hair surrounding her face like a curtain, her skin hot to the touch under the sheets, her ample amounts of energy now spent. Nanami smiled to herself--one bad habit installed, fifty more to go.  
And once awake, Juri will surely wonder why Nanami did not roust her from a slumber so deep.  
'Don't ask.' Nanami will whisper against her lips.

-

[What Makes Her]

All her photographs from that time in school make her look like some sort of sexual Charles Manson--unkempt and wild-eyed, ready to attack no matter who looks on in fear...only with touchable edges, not so rough.  
A challenge was thrown down when she was but a child, the sharp point of a dagger going through her hand and making her stay to the ground--trapped and bleeding by a need so strong, stronger than even her own mortality.  
Now, torn loose like Christ from the cross, she is free--never-mind the realities, never-mind the illusions.  
Pictures taken with flash catch her smile, slow and sly and knowing...they capture what makes her rise and fall, what makes her whole after so long of being part of two.

-

[Cottonmouth]

Easy to be remembered as a dream...but not to be really forgotten as truth...  
So, in hazy light and soft hues, afternoon burns away as one room--piano, cold floor--becomes another room--pink walls, breeze through sheets. And one boy--aching and needy--becomes a body on a bed--gasping, grasping--for the most seductive of princes.  
That melody of some distant garden is never as loud as when heard from beneath warm skin, Miki thinks before slipping away and back to black-and-white keys.

-

[Johnny Ace Is Dead]

Planets and stars will soon die, like all things must. Anthy knows this and is glad for this. It is right for life to be like this. Flowers wilt, animals stop breathing, skin wrinkles and rots.  
And so, as if a tiny black-hole opens its mouth, Akio is sucked back through time--away from endless searching for his better half sitting on that concrete world, away from his storybook land of fools gold, away from the anger and sadness that made him a man.  
Anthy can watch his light go out up in the heavens and no longer feels that quiet kind of malice she used to feel.  
He has passed on and she is at peace with that, knowing one day she too will go where he goes, dancing with the atoms of creation once more.

---

END [for now…]  


  


  


  


  


  


  
  
  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  



	11. d r a b b l e s o f d e a t h

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: multiple

---

[And Modesty Turns A Blind Eye]

On the pages and in the words little girls use, it can be candy-coated. That doesn't bother them really.  
It can be pink like Utena's hair against a white tile floor.  
It can be white like Utena's skin uncovered at night.  
The tales told can be as pure as the love Utena has for Anthy.  
But Anthy knows better, she remembers well and never forgets and she plays with the red rose most times---that delicate flesh blooms, humid as a hothouse and envelopes her, devours her like a venus fly-trap--but they keep that part silent.  
Little girls, tiny princesses-in-waiting, rarely understand the desires of a prince...at least not like a witch can.

-

[Itch To Scratch]

She had not yet met that devil on her shoulder, that plum-haired princess of destruction. She had not yet entered Ohtori and the games inside of the gate.  
Her pale fingers, still strong and sure, were already pushing the coffin open...showing the way for her feet to follow, the branches pushed back and allowing her to pass unscathed.  
There was something for her, out there in the world, something only for her and made for her and that needed her as she needed it--her destiny called like a foghorn, catching her vision and drawing it to the sea of unknown possibilities.

-

[Tender As Ivy]

The thing he liked most about Winter was the fact that he could wear that long overcoat--he bought it in a second hand store, needing something heavy for the cold months.  
It had rabbit fur around the lapels, which he did not approve of, but really had no choice in the matter. And the outer shell was dark brown corduroy, slippery satin lining on the inside.  
The buttons were chubby, better to grasp with cold fingers.  
So, now that snow lingered on the ground--waiting for more, some said--and the wind was bitter, Miki could wear his coat.  
He could walk down the sidewalk and let his eyes catch on the multi-colored bags of shoppers.  
Miki had people to shop for, of course.  
A gold watch for his father. A nice dress for his mother.   
There were perks to living in Paris most of the year...they loved his gifts when he came home.  
Kozue was hard to buy gifts for. Too expensive and she would look at you like a nun might, scolding you for trying to be impressive. Too cheap and she would toss it aside like a child, making you feel utterly miserable.  
Miki could never find the middle ground it seemed, even now...even away from Ohtori, duels and deception...he could not seem to find that 'happy place' everyone of them was looking for.  
Kozue says she has found it. She is living life as she pleases, college and boyfriends and what-not.   
Miki hasn't found it yet, though he believes it is there--waiting for him somewhere. Behind the lights along the lampposts or under the ivy weaved into wreaths...Miki pulls the coat tighter around him, stepping past the people.  
He is trying not to run away from them and to his hotel room, to the sweet confines of a silent place where even his self-doubts and his tiny agonies cannot badger him.

-

[Just Like]

No one told her the words to say or the ways to hurt others.  
She just knew. Others, when growing up, would talk to imaginary friends with silly names. She talked to herself, that voice inside of her, that girl under her own skin who begged to take over--  
_youarenothingtheyhateyouihateyoutheydonotlikeyounoonelovesyouyouarenothingyouarenothingyouarenothing_  
--and one day she just let go of trying to be better, to be someone she was not. She is cruel. She is painful. Just like an open wound, just like a thief, just like a thousand tiny needles driven under fingernails.

-

[Pillow Talk]

You could say it just happened, but then, that would not be the whole truth.  
Girls loved Touga even as a child. Loved his long hair and his pale skin and his azure eyes. They treated him like some porcelain doll--until he grew older. Then they treated him like candy....to be licked, nibbled and eaten....  
But that is not all the story, not really.  
Boys liked Touga as well. Loved his attitude, his charm, his physical prowess--some liked more than that, looking at his nakedness in quick glances--_why can't I be him? why can't I have him? why?_  
Still, that is not all to this...because Touga loved himself.  
Loved to see his body move, loved to hear his own voice speak, loved to feel the clothes slide against his own skin.  
Some times, he would stand in front of his mirror--completely nude--and study the dips and hollows, the flesh all hands wanted to travel along. And he let his hands caress, let his eyes close and let his body revel in his own self-wonder.  
After all, Touga knew he was his own best lover.  


-

[Conversations With A Dead Girl]

'I do not know   
who I was when I did those things...'  
She says, fiddling with her cup, with her spoon, with her sugar packets of white and pink. She hopes her words make sense now and that this person opposite will believe her, will understand her.  
'...or who I said I was or whether I willed to feel what I had read about...'  
This person sitting across from her still owns those books, still turns those pages with a child's grace. Can this person hear her now? Can this person realize how hard it was to feel yourself split apart like a shell?  
'...or who in fact was there with me or whether I knew, even then that there was doubt about these things...'  
Utena reaches out and grasps cold arms, tugging a lifeless form to her warm body, crying and not comprehending why things must be this way. Are the answers still as foggy as years ago? Can the past never truly sleep? And does this child, this fragile girl that Utena used to be, does she understand any better than who she grew to be?

-

[It Felt Like]

If you breathe, it will shatter like glass...just right now, time stopping and the world is not spinning...how fitting, how dramatic for our fairy-tale to end like this.  
A prince reaches for the princess--does not matter that it be a coffin and not a tower, does not matter that there is no hair for a ladder--and air is their only barrier to joining once again.  
But no, not this time. Swords are eager lovers and they want to kiss you. The past below needs you and so pulls you under.  
And time kicks in once more, sounding like a hurricane of hate, like the static of lost chances.  
I can tell you it felt just like that.

-

[It Isn't, But It Is]

'Tell me about the past then, say the words and I'll try to believe they are true.' Kozue grinned, knowing that the girl sitting beside her and clutching shopping bags like the edge of a cliff, would not answer.  
'Some of us grow, some of us do not--which are you now I wonder?' Kozue mused out loud, sliding her gaze like a knife to Shiori's Snow White face--a weird sort of innocence to retain after living among short little strangers for so long--Kozue laughed out loud.   
'You've not changed at all.' Shiori said coldly, abruptly standing up and facing Kozue, blocking out the winter sun with her shadow.  
'You have not changed. I have not changed. **Nothing** has changed...or have you not realized it?' Shiori finished before striding away. Kozue stayed seated, still smiling to herself and liking the strength in Shiori's retreating spine.  
'Everything has changed, dear Shiori...and yet, as you say, nothing has changed at all...' Kozue whispered, watching the birds take off into flight.

-

[Fade, Faded]

She could not compare it to anything, the feeling of slipping and sliding and drifting away from the awareness of her mind--plummeting off a precipice of sanity and into the ocean of turbulent emotions--it was the rush of the wind against her skin, billowing her dress out and open--like a parachute--icy fingers of wind running up her body and into the deepest recesses of her soul.  
Once she surfaced again, the salt falling from her curves, a new person was born, emerging from a shell and walking upon the wet sand.  
She dreams of dry heat and of claiming land like a demented conquistador.

-

[The Actions of the Wounded]

So many times has that question tumbled along his mind, when he was sleeping or entering a dream--dreams of a highway to nowhere, of intentions of golden good--yet he never reached an answer, not in all that time, never a suitable answer was found. And perhaps, when all the lights go out and the shade of night is permanent, no answer is the only answer for his battered heart and noble chin. No answers become the foundation of his moss-covered castle hanging in the sky like a weeping-willow of stone.

-

[Concrete Fantasies]

Those lines we have set up are becoming so blurred.  
You above and me below, you wise and bitter--me naive and hopeful. Do you see some shadow of who you used to be in me, is that why you touch my face? Are you seeing something in my eyes beyond the mixture of shock and arousal confused with admiration?  
I didn't know you dressed that way, in your nightgown of finely woven silk. I didn't know that there are sides to you that no one sees.  
Except perhaps me, tonight, with your lips so close to mine.

-

[Wounded]

The reasons for her malice became so unclear to her  
own ears and to her own mind, the path she chose  
to walk down merged with darkness and longing--it turned into  
a maze within her own emotions, a trap of her own making--did she understand her heart then? As her fingers gripped a golden locket and the breeze from a beautiful sunny day cut into her room...those soul-deep wounds began to bleed once more.  
How dare anyone love the completely unlovable.

-

[A Shattering Wind]

Anthy did not place too much importance on clocks.  
It could be a minute or hour or day.  
Years tend to blend together, mixing the colors of the days and nights, creating a masterpiece of never-ending misunderstandings.  
Clocks brush stroke onto the canvas, stark white and black.  
Numbers become lives and lives become as meaningless as numbers. Anthy took the clocks from the walls.  
She left the windows open so time could fly free and so the wind could pick them up, pick her up, pick up the very world.  
Anthy knows she might shatter against the air, but those are chances that numbers must take if they do not want to be trapped by that murderer called time.

-

[Between You and Me]

It is not so simple as a secret.  
Secrets can be kept for as long as your life, taken to the grave and buried underground. Secrets can slip out, though you say by accident, and lie on the floor.  
Ready to trip you, ready to catch you.  
It is not so simple as that for you and I. Because, between you and me, our type of love is no better than a beautiful killer.  
Both our hands hold the knife handle, both of our fingers are stained with gunpowder.  
We've always done things together and why should this one matter so much?

-

[Dancers On the Edge of Forever]

What was once habit is now a feeling, a clutching and strangling emotion deep inside. Fingers as brittle as dried mud, stretching out from below and reaching upward...this is not Egypt, we are not mummies...but it feels like we've been under rock and dust for ages now.  
Kanae gave her a poisonous flower. She watched their purple petals fold and embrace one delicate hand. She could have trembled with happiness as Anthy fell forward and hit the floor.  
Anthy dreamed of a blonde prince wrapped in thorns.  
Funny that...Anthy didn't see her past a blaze of pink, all those years ago...

---

END [for now…]  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  



	12. drabbles with a MTO slant

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[A Funny Thing Happened On the Way To Get the Spice]

Kiryuu Nanami has pictured her life before.  
The first days, the full life, the mourned ending.  
And she could have never, ever--in a million, billion years--have pictured *this* occurring.  
Looking for a spice in the middle of the ocean with her trusting trio...well, maybe it is rather dramatic, to be doing this--a quest for her dear dear oniisama--yes, that makes this somewhat better.  
But then, Nanami could not wrap her mind around three elephants on surf-boards...barrelling down on her with obvious intent to kill.  
Maybe it was karma. Or just bad luck. Or fate...yes, Nanami believed it was fate that brought these elephants into her life to torment her and block her path.  
They didn't understand that it would just make her work harder.

-

[A Day in the Life]

There had to be more than this to life, Akio thought idly as he rang up dish detergent and ramen noodle packages and cigarettes.  
All the girls at the other counters were always 'checking' **him** out...Akio knew he was good-looking.  
Too good looking to be in this small town, working in a stupid Walmart, going nowhere.  
His mother always said he had a model's face. His father always beat him for being too 'pretty'.   
But still, here Akio was, ringing up shit for customers and sipping a flat Coke.  
A sudden pat on the back startled him and Akio turned around to be face-to-face with the manager.  
'Congratulations, son. You are employee of the month.'  
And Akio looked at his picture being nailed to the wall, along with the others before him.  
Is this as close to fame as he would ever get?

-

[I'll Be Your Mick Ronson]

If beautiful is a word, then in between the letters--we can all see you, standing against the sun and gorgeous.  
Just as worshiped, just as adored, just as needed.  
And me, being a creature of the night, I merely skulk around the edge of you...merely try to touch you, merely try to soak up a bit of your wonderfulness...  
You are a star.  
And we are not friends.  
I am the sidekick, the stand-in, the one you fuck with and leave behind when new personas call, when a new bed opens, when new arms await.

-

[Seen And Heard]

He had been sitting for hours, staring at the stark white of canvas.  
And the piano gathered dust. The keys had edges of brown on them now and were chipped.  
Miki knew it was wrong to ignore it, to abandoned that which carried him for so long.  
Like a bad lover, Miki stopped touching and caressing.  
The brush is frozen in his hand. All the ideas of paint and creation seem stunted now, faced with the opportunity to actually **do** something about these feelings.  
Miki wants to be seen and not heard.  
That way...that way....  
A car backfires in the alley below and Miki drops the brush to the floor.  
....that way, he cannot be found ever again....

-

[The Lost & the Found]

No one would ever be around to ask, of course...not in this world anyway. And Anthy did not think she could truly articulate her feelings anyhow--even if every one of the students got free from Ohtori and seek her out, just to question her broken heart.  
How can she explain the emotions, those kept in check for so long and now free?  
That is was like coming home, but being too late--the place is empty. All that is left are the dusty pictures on the wall and the musty curtains and the bed that looks like it was just vacated by its owner...sheets rumpled and covers thrown back in haste, vaguely warm to the touch...  
If asked, Anthy could maybe say those things about it all, about finally finding her prince in this waking world.  
About walking down the little paths in between tombstones, about her eyes turning to liquid glass without her consent, about the mocking white roses in her hands, about the very happy sun in the very happy blue sky.  
Maybe she could say those things...if asked at all.  
But no one says a word here that Anthy wants to listen to.  
All is quiet for this reunion.  
Anthy lays the flowers down and sinks to her knees, the grass below a soft cushion to her weary body. She runs her fingers over the name and the date--not at all shocked that her prince, her Utena, died years and years ago.  
_I found you at last, my prince...what was lost is now found, what was shattered is now whole..._Anthy said inwardly, trying with everything to be what Utena wished for her to be.  
Strong. Independent. Eager to be alive.  
'Oh Utena...but what good is being alive if I am without you?' Anthy whispered aloud.  
No one answered.

-

[Child of the Trees]

She dreamed up a story about a boy lost, growing up without parents in the green of the forest. And he lived in the treetops, he lived off of river-water and slept on beds of moss. But he died without love, without arms to hold him or words to soothe him.  
Kozue had a funny feeling that she killed the boy in reality, for he was her--hanging from the vines, twisted up in the brambles of a fading youth and an illusion of family--the boy had to die. Just as she, too, must perish in order to survive.

-

[What Price Forgiveness?]

And so she kept very still, fear of moving and drawing that old familiar gaze her way...it paralyzed her, it made her muscles freeze and turned her bones to granite.  
And what would Juri give up this time for her?   
Another cheap picture in another gold locket? Another orange rose upon her breast? Another heavy sword in her hand?  
What would Juri let go of once more to satisfy that dark desire within? Her heart and soul? Her will and strength?  
Everything...?

-

[No Real Importance]

Juri was looking for Miki, but found the sister. And those eyes were sharp enough to cut mere mortals. Not that Juri noticed, not that Juri cared.  
Kozue was waiting for her latest boyfriend and he was late when Juri walked in. And those eyes were so cold, they could freeze weaker people. Not that Kozue noticed, not that Kozue cared.  
It was no accident though, that they both ended up there...by that stupid piano, alone, with the sounds of Ohtori muted just for them.  
'Are you looking for someone?' Kozue asked with a small grin. Juri looked away.  
'It's of no real importance.' Juri replied.

-

[You Mentioned A Thing Called Agony]

Not because it was like this, not because she did not want it....Utena trembled like a child caught naked by icy wind because it was too much.  
To be held down, to be shoved around, to be pushed until bruises spread over her arms in delicate shades of blue and purple...like flowers, like buds opening under heat...  
Juri kissed her until her lips began to bleed.  
And the older girl did not wipe it away, did not ask forgiveness, did not put on kid-gloves.  
She took and ripped it out and pulled it down.  
And Utena let her.  
She would have to clean up her broken body later.

-

[Morning Finds You]

After living somewhere for years, it loses its beauty.  
Even the City of Lights, with the crumbling brick-work and cobblestone back alleys, stone monuments of angels with crystal clear water pouring out of their cold lips.  
Yes, all that can get...mundane.  
Miki has been up since dawn.   
He watched the sun crest up in the sky, chasing away dusky blue and smearing the world with yellow-orange cellophane.  
And then, as if to show Miki up in his own thoughts, those bright colors shot through the window.  
A shaft of incandescent light hit a pool of red hair upon a white pillow, making it burn like a coal in a fire. And it graced this man's bare shoulders, outlining them with sun.  
Touga always slept in late.  
And if Miki thought that perhaps he was growing tired of mornings in this life, all he had to see was this imagery to change his mind.

-

[One Star Awake]

For a brief second, Utena felt her world dissolve under her feet and felt all she held dear crumble in her fingers.  
Like sand in the ocean, like dirt passing through the air.  
_She was little, too little to understand the pain of death or the anguish of loss.  
She was so young, too young to be so alone and too young to be so desperate.  
And Utena crawled into a warm place of hiding, side by side with the only ones who loved her, the only ones she loved. She turned her cheek to the white satin and began her sleep of the dead._  
Now, struggling at the end of it all, wounded and weak and used, Utena still cannot believe that this is her time to die.  
A voice inside her--no longer a trapped Dios, no longer a wish maker Akio--calls to her and urges her to rise.  
'...there's always one star awake...' It says softly and Utena, for all she has seen, still believes.

-

[Layers]

He could be very smart most times. Maybe not book smart, for that bored him most times. He liked, when younger, to play baseball and run through the woods with his friends.  
He liked to climb trees and get cut and not cry.  
He did not feel important, but he is a boy--and boys, no matter how popular or obscure--do not cry when bleeding.  
As the days grew longer, he became taller and his body was stretching outward, bones reaching out and voice changing.  
He did not feel like a prince, like someone who a pretty girl could love...like a pretty special girl with chestnut hair could love...  
Tatsuya ate all things to grow up strong.  
But never onions, never those.

-

[And Galaxies Above]

'It is a bit cold...don't you think?' Anthy murmured against Utena's neck.   
'Yea. A little.' Utena answered back softly.  
'Maybe we should go inside?' Anthy questioned, wrapping her arms more securely around Utena's neck.  
'Maybe...' Utena hushed out, tightening her hold about Anthy's waist.  
They had been dancing for hours it seemed, from the last moments of the sun and now way into the early morning. Time, of course, had no meaning.  
They had talked and laughed as they moved around the top of this building, swaying to music only the two of them could hear.  
And the both of them offered the other their coat at various points in the evening, to ward off the chill that floats throughout the city.  
But here they were, still waltzing around and letting words die on their lips.  
Letting dawn come slowly in this world made of eternal bliss.

-

[Rain Was Present]

It was raining.  
A grey sheet of cold water that you could not see through. A metal wall surrounding the day, blocking out any bit of sun or warmth.  
Utena was cold as she dashed around the corner and into another person running as well, both of them dodging raindrops and eager to reach an eave for safety.  
Juri shook her umbrella and felt the water curl over her sunset ringlets, slip down her face.   
Utena apologized for almost sending the both of them to the soggy and hard pavement.  
'That's okay.' Juri answered quietly.  
'Good...that's good then.' Utena said breathlessly, from the cold and the quick movements and from..., from something else she did not understand and could never be explained.  
The rain did not let up, only got stronger in its assault on the world.   
And they traded information lightly. Oh this job...oh this town...oh this car...oh damn this weather...so on and so forth.  
The more they talked, the more they moved closer to one another.  
It was a shock, then, for Juri to look over and study Utena's face...wondering idly if maybe they had met before.  
Utena stared back, unafraid of scrutiny--unafraid of those eyes like the ocean looking into her own eyes of now clouded blue.  
'Let's get a cab or something...maybe one can see us under here?' Utena suggested. Juri stepped out into the storm, waving her hands and Utena did the same, grinning wide.  
This felt familiar to Utena, standing beside this woman and feeling an understanding pass through her body.  
No cab stopped. Even the pull of money was not enough to brave busy streets with no vision. They were wet once more.  
'We should just make a run for it. I have a room close by..you could dry off...' Juri said, scanning a non-existent horizon.  
'After you.' Utena said with a smile as they darted out, weaving in and out of cars, skin numb to more water now, avoiding people in much the same predicament.  
As they walked in the lobby, Utena felt the air leave her lungs in heated breath. Juri felt her muscles tighten as they stood silent in the elevator.  
Once in the room, nothing was said. It was as if neither woman was there at all.  
Utena felt the towel first, upon her wet head and then felt the pressure behind it....rubbing the pink locks dry, slow and sure. And Utena leaned back, felt Juri's body solid against her.  
Solid, strong, perfect. It felt like a version of home--a moment of peace and comfort.  
'Stay if you want.' Juri said quietly, letting the towel drop.  
'I want.' Utena replied.

---

END [for now…]  


  
  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  


  



	13. and lo, more drabbles

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Multiple…

---

[Labyrinth]

Utena thought of her past as a fading photograph, cracked and yellow and edges smooth with time.  
She could see herself now, walking down a small gravel path to a church--_bells ahead, bells above, ringing and ringing_--and how little she is, dress of charcoal and white, eyes blotted out...no longer bright blue, but the hollow black of death.  
'Who are you?' Utena feels like asking.  
Who is this girl, this child who knows only fear and despair?  
Is it the same now, her little girl fingers tearing at Utena's insides as she lay bleeding and dying?  
Helping to make the wound wider, helping it rip a bit more...?  
And now, with a glittering sea of hate and a useless prince of days dead, Utena feels connected to her own mortal time.  
Her hair fanned out, pointing to all directions--_clocks and minutes, time infinite, time suspended and caught in a noose_--Utena is time.  
And it means nothing to be dead for she died a long time ago.  


-

[Thinking of Tomorrow]

Outside of the window, it is snowing.  
Inside the house, all is silent.  
And Kanae fell asleep with her school dress still on, lipstick still clinging to her cold lips and blush still highlighting her cheekbones.  
One soft brown leather shoe falls to the floor.  
She was trying to remember a time before this moment, desperate to recall a fleeting image in her mind--of candy castles, white horseflesh and glittering gold--those storybook fantasies lulled her to slumber as she grew into womanhood.  
How those years fly by, whipping her hair back like a gust of steady wind...  
Five to eight to twelve. All gone and all in shadow now.  
Kanae cannot see her hand in front of her face anymore.  
She can only see his face, the first time in the sun and his soft lips upon her brow.

-

[None So Cold]

Divided.  
I have used that word more in my long long lifetime than is necessary, clutched to its meaning in hopes of giving my unexplainable motivations a reason beyond reproach.  
But no definition comes to mind in the hours in which you sleep beside me, hand still loose in my own and lips parted in speechless dreaming.  
I flounder and sink to the bottom of my ocean. Upon the bed of rusted ship hulls and slimy seaweed are the remnants of all my dreams...rotten and lifeless, like myself...and yet they speak to me.  
Ghostly rambles about how that ticking of a heart in my chest is just a bomb waiting to explode, how those wires of red are now pumping blood and bringing me back to life.  
And all because of you, so innocent and naive and painfully unaware of everything nefarious.  
Of everything dark and lonely.  
Of everything that is your Princess.  
Divided.  
If I could tell you what this means to me, in a language you could understand...  
_'You behold none so cold as I, Utena-sama...and, yet, you behold the only one who could love you so...'_  


-

[But A Whisper In the Storm]

Her mixture of feelings could only fall down like this, tumbling forward with all the preciousness of building blocks.  
Red. Blue. Yellow. Green.  
And that castle she built, she watched it fall from beneath his smooth as satin skin and his velvet curtain of hair, a nice dark burgundy in the dark of this night.  
What she felt was no mere child's play, now she knew that with all certainty...this was of biblical proportions--her grasping hands and her raw throat--my God, whose temple was being torn down with his lips?  
She did not question its reality, though it may very well be a dream...a fantasy conjured up by the melting pot of minds in this tiny little world on which they all spin...  
She did not question the emptiness that found her with the gray light of dawn, the barren landscape of her bared soul.  
  
-

[Her Will Be Done]

Juri is only as strong as she wants to be, drifting down the cool tiles and buried under hot water.  
Delicate and pulsing heat, needles to her skin...and Anthy sits outside, baking in the sun of a hot summer day in an unknown city.  
But all cities lose their names the moment Anthy steps into them, the letters fall from the signs and float away--white slips twisted by the wind.  
Anthy drinks cold water, the beads of liquid sliding down glass and onto her exposed chest, winding down her brown torso and disappearing among the folds of skirt.  
Juri would look good out here in the light, not in a dark pit within her amnesiac soul, never there again.  
_'The bathroom is all yours now...'_ Juri says quietly.  
Anthy closes her eyes and smiles, her lips not moving though she most certainly speaks.  
_'The sun misses its fallen angel.'_  
So Juri steps out, much like a bird hatching, and turns to gold....but then....you know the rest....  


-

[And Good Will Come To Pass]

Fights often happen, though they do not last for long...the harbored ill will de-thaws and the lake is once more placid.  
For a while.  
Not for long.  
And the love-making is so troubled, so frantic and full of scars.   
_the locket hangs on the wall, it swings back and forth like a guillotine_  
The kisses drive Juri mad--for they are too perfect coming from her lips as the hours drift away into morning--Utena is perfect in her shattered nobility.  
_a white rose stays fresh while all others wilt and fade_  
Utena talks in her sleep and Juri spoons about her naked body.  
Someday, when they stop dreaming, better moments shall prevail.  


-

[I Feel Pretty]

__

'i feel pretty, oh so pretty  
i feel pretty and witty and gay!'  
West Side Story  
  
After the time he forgot, those moments when there were blurs of flowers...**maybe**...and bright metal, Saionji grew up.  
His kept his hair long and finished school and fell into the rat-race and got married and had children.  
Before the time he forgot, though, was something all-together different.  
As if washed in a puddle of gasoline, Saionji can recall some distant moment...**or maybe not so distant**...and it makes him hide from the gaudy colors presented.  
_Touga put lipstick on his lips and blush on his cheeks and he said 'aren't we pretty tonight?' with a laugh and he kissed his forehead and shoved him out into the night_  
But Saionji thinks he might be making this up.  
Like a castle in the sky perhaps.  
But he eyes that nice little number in the closet, the one with the deep emerald green and shiny glitter sheen.  
And Saionji swears he can feel his pulse jump in anticipation.

  
-

[More Of Me Into You]

Shiori likes for the two of them to stand side-by-side sometimes, arms barely touching...just a breath away...  
If she looks just the right way and the light is just so and no one interrupts them--Shiori can feel something between them merge.  
All the imperfections blend with the perfections, all the subtle hues and the blinding colors swim together.  
Shiori feels a little bit whole then.  
Not so empty, not so useless, not so beneath everything and everyone.  
Shiori wonders if Juri can see it, if she can see how their faces interchange and their blood mixes and their hair becomes tangled into one glorious knot.  


-

[Venus As A Boy]

It is so easy to fool you, you who believes all the answers are held deep within my eyes and all the wisdom of your yearnings are caught in my lavender hair.  
When we touch, I wonder at what you see here before you--a slender youth, frail enough to remind you of your past and strong enough to pierce hearts with the stem of our black roses--who does your mechanical heart see?  
You, drowning in your delusions, do not know how much I love to hear you say this name I stole from a dead boy.  
I am no longer a girl, no longer a Rose Bride, no longer a witch.  
I am your Mamiya.  
And when you kiss my lips, I am your Mamiya still--I give you solace in the dark and you give me a new identity to run with, one without female constraints or limitations.  
I feel the same fascination as you do, long and pale fingers against my smooth chest and I feel the same odd desire bubble upward as you grip me tight by my slim hips.  
I find that I hate the thought of shattering your dreams...  
...for I shall be shattering mine as well...  


-

[If Dawn Is An Illusion]

Juri stepped outside one morning and decided that this was the end of all things.  
A distant rumble echoed over the clouds, sounding like the crescendo of a wave or the churning of wheels or the cracking of the world.  
Juri walked away from her foil and her dreams. She sat upon a seat, grabbing the wheel and heard the smallest of giggles from inside the jeep.  
And a locket fell into a river, dying from lack of air where she did not.  


-

[Magic Man]

As the light filtered through the leaves and the heat was unbearable, Kanae slipped her shoes off.  
Her toes pushed into the coolness of the grass and she threw her head back, closing her eyes to the oppressive sunlight.  
But his warm voice slid over her suddenly.  
Kanae looked over slowly to see him lounging beside her, on her blanket, digging around in her picnic basket.  
She had seen him before, around this park. Sometimes in early morning or sometimes near dusk...sometimes, just sometimes, under the nighttime sky--like a dream perhaps, an illusion that Kanae was drawn to despite herself.  
He offered her an apple and she did not remember packing one today. It was large and shiny red.  
It looked delicious.   
And the first bite pulled her under, the sweet juice attacking her taste-buds and overflowing past her lips...down her chin...  
He offered to catch it before it dotted her blouse.  
She thought he meant a napkin. Just a napkin perhaps.  
It was no cloth he used, no cloth at all.  
_I try not to waste a thing..._ He whispered to her, his lips and tongue delicately cleaning her skin.  
And Kanae knew this was wrong, such acts in daylight and with a stranger. But her will to fight was gone with the first taste of the forbidden fruit.  


-

[The Traveler]

__

The further I get from home, the more I wonder why I left and what I am looking for...Is it all just trying to grasp onto something forgotten? Or I am just trying to forget it all?  
Tatsuya sits on a train heading north, past the frozen wasteland of this place he knows so little about. A dot on a map surrounded by a country he knows nothing about.  
A language he does not speak. People he does not recognize.  
But that is okay--he has his cheap paperback novel about a girl named Jane Eyre, he has his bottle of water rolling at his feet.  
And underneath his button up shirt, his thick jacket, his corduroy pants...under all that is a boy.  
A boy plagued by nightmares of a trip to the bottom of the Earth. Of a desire so strong it nearly broke him. Of a past shadowed with phantoms, dancing against an orange wall.  
The girl in his book--she is delicate of body yet strong of will--it reminds Tatsuya of a girl he once knew.  
_And we were happy, once...I did not understand her but I loved her. Where did she go? What happened to her? Did I lose her? Did I want to lose her...?_  
Tatsuya falls asleep and dreams that he is digging up dirt. Rows and rows of it. A garden, his garden, the one he abandoned ages ago.  
And a girl grows there. Her hair has become roots, her skin a yellowish-white. She is beautiful.  
More gorgeous than Tatsuya can recall.  
More real than even he is, sleeping on a train in the middle of nowhere.  


-

[Reflections]

It was a sobering image.  
To see Himemiya Anthy standing opposite, sword raised level with the steady stare of her green eyes. Violet hair down, the ends fluttering with the slight breeze and strands getting caught on golden tassels at the shoulder.  
The golden tassels of a prince, yet no ring on that hand--no Rose Crest that would indicate the reselling of her soul.  
And the rose that was pinned to Anthy's uniform did not glare with pure white.  
It was the lightest shade of pink.  
As if mixed ever so slightly, a hint of red into a sea of ivory. Like blood might look if rubbed off of Nanami's skin.  
Nanami could not see herself now.  
_Who stood there, with her weapons yet to be drawn? A child--a wounded and desperate girl, her heart shattered and her fingers smelling of wet cardboard? A young woman--a woman pretending to understand the world when all she wants to do is run away?_   
Nanami's old dueling uniform felt too tight. The rose of startling yellow blinded her. Ohtori felt like an oppressive hothouse.  
_Must she always come back to this place, to these feelings?_  
Anthy began a slow walk toward Nanami.   
And Nanami did not raise her dagger, she just waited. Anthy's walk was so sure and confident. This was not the Rose Bride. This was not the wicked witch in the tower.  
Nanami felt her breath catch once Anthy stood but an inch from her....This is Anthy, the real Anthy.  
_'This is not a game, no play duel...'_ Anthy whispered, as if the words were magic. But there was this sparkle in Anthy's eyes that Nanami caught--a dancing of unexplainable humor. Nanami felt a grin tug at her lips now.  
_I did not think so, Himemiya._   
And Nanami shoved Anthy away, pulling her dagger up quick--then charging full-out to her prey.  
And Anthy kept her blade poised, ready, willing, so very eager...Once metal rang out, it dulled the sound of brass bells ringing. Once their eyes met in mutual fury, the prying eyes of each ghost just faded away.  
  
---

End [for now…]  



	14. updateth of drabbles

Drabbles

By spheeris1

Pairings: Various

Warnings/notes: See first part…

---

[Angel]

Utena blamed alcohol the first time.  
She was not used to the affects a drink could have on one's mind.  
Her stomach was swimming and her vision was blurry and her memory kept crying out: _I know this girl somehow and she was a bitch_...  
But the second time, who could Utena blame but herself?  
For following this girl home, for listening to her go on and on about herself, for watching her undress with practiced scorn, for watching her fall asleep like a child...  
_I knew this girl and she is a bitch_...  
But then, Utena recalled, she used to be really annoying in her naivete. Her sunny disposition--when seen through these new eyes--bothered her.  
Foolishness is so unattractive.  
Nanami mumbles for Utena to 'never come back here again'.  
So Utena won't.

--

[Meltdown]

When they met up again, some of those things that should remain unchanged...had changed.  
Like Anthy dressed all different. And she said things she never would have said back at Ohtori.  
Utena was happy, but a part of her was nervous. Nervous that it might all be an act or that it was all a dream.  
Each time Utena thought those things, Anthy would smile over at her.  
It was not placid. It was like a tidal wave of warmth.  
Utena had changed as well.  
She no longer believed in fairy tales. And she did not care too much for other people anymore.  
Not like she did before and certainly not like she did for Anthy...Utena's trapped 'princess' was always put before the rest.  
And all the others that Utena might have noticed had she not been staring at Anthy? Well, they just slipped through the cracks.  
Something lurked under the surface when they talked or when they got close to each other or as night fell around them.  
Something far more drastic had metamorphosed over the time they had been parted, something had taken root and grown into a wild thing.  
It was desire.  
No doomed love affairs or castle romance, no flowers opening to the air, no hands held under moonlight.  
It was sexual tension. Pure and simple and overwhelming.  
Under every compliment was a suggestion and beneath every grin was a fantasy.  
Utena was no prince now. She was just a young woman who wanted to take Anthy's clothes off, to lay her down and ease this burning fire within her own body.  
So, when it was another one of their moments to see one another, Anthy asked her in.  
And Utena tried to make small talk or just be silent or to just leave. In the end, Utena did none of those things.  
She did what she wanted to do.  
_Anthy against the wall, eyes shut and mouth open...until it is filled with my tongue, until I am underneath her clothing and touching her skin, until I am all over her and we slide to the floor, floor so cold to this heat and I cannot get enough of this feeling, this pulsing pushing grinding feeling..._  
'I love you...' Anthy whispered.  
And Utena did not know if the other woman noticed or not that she did not say it in return.

--

[Getting Through]

__

Slave to all and a Master to none  
And Anthy carved that into one of the desks at Ohtori with a dull knife.  
A sharp edge was not allowed to her.  
But she preferred it dull anyway. Then she must press down harder and use more force.  
It felt good to take her anger out on these shiny and new wooden desks.  
Then she would know which seat would be hers, for when she must pretend to listen in class and pretend to takes tests and pretend that grades were important somehow.  
It was all part of the game. Akio's game. The Rose Bride game.  
She is a misshapen puzzle piece.  
She is a shiny black pawn.  
She is a silver ball shot into flashing lights.  
Anthy threw the knife against the wall and slammed her fists onto the surface.  
But all her mind could utter was a miserable 'game over'...  


--

[God Likes To Dance]

'It is always the same here, you know...' Saionji muttered as his lips wrapped around the bottle top.  
And though I pretended to laugh **at** him, not **with** him, my eyes were trained on his mouth.  
A perfect 'o' of ruby red, sucking down his...fourth beer of the night.  
_Lips like those are better for other things..._, a little voice in my head whispered with a decidedly perverted leer.  
But I pushed away from the bar and danced into the crowd, which--much like a dark wave--sucked me under. Then you can either sink or swim.  
Or the ocean of sweaty bodies just parts for you, which is what they do for me.  
More hands touch me. More nameless and faceless people press against me.  
Here, tonight, right now--I am not just a god, I am God.  
And Saionji, my school buddy from years ago, he just does not get it. Music does nothing for him, nor does fashion or ambiguous sexuality.  
Saionji likes beer. And girls, lots of delicate girls you can take home to your mother and eat off of like precious china.  
So why do I bring him here? And why does he follow me in?  
And then I figure it out, like one of those lightbulbs flashing up above my head.  
His eyes are watching me. Only me. And he is here for me. Only me.  
I am **his** God.  


--

[Hanging]

Saionji thought that maybe it was all a dream anyway. _A weird and wonderful and frightening dream--a dream pretending to be reality, a reality trapped in a nightmare._  
Touga, on the other-hand, knew more. _He always had to know more about everything...power, women, fashion. And if he did not know, then he found ways to gain the knowledge._  
Akio felt like an emperor. _A throne of shiny red, sitting at the top of the world...like a girl upon millions of mattresses.  
But his long hair always got tangled in his crown of gilded leaves..._  
Quick flashes of the camera disengaged individual thoughts, bringing the three of them back to the present...or what was left of it...whatever time meant up here in thin air...  
They were hanging on the clock-hands, they were suspended by a notion of eternity.  
And those up on high do not think about the long walk down.  


--

[Not Another Chance]

I let her in the door and shut it tight.  
That was okay--the gnawing doubt and surge of fear could be contained.  
For the moment.  
But I could not help it...seeing her face, seeing that face of that girl I tried to save, seeing her brown hands--those hands that held the sword that pierced my skin and left me to die...  
I cannot help how I feel.  
My mind tried to forget, tried to absolve a hidden betrayal.  
_'I've searched for you for so long...'_ She tells me and I try to hear her.  
To hear the princess who is now free, who wants to be with me, who wishes to give me the world in return for my shattered nobility...for my persistence to her cause...  
And the words come out without my consent.  
_Not this time...no more chances...I cannot, I just cannot...'_  
Her tender and wounded eyes crack beneath my gaze, her future and reason for living taken away...and I wish I could take it all back...  
...but I cannot...  


--

[Birds & Bees]

Touga sat the folder down in front of each member of the Student Council. As the President, it was his job to bring forth any matters for voting...or approval...or to implement any new rules at Ohtori.  
  
Miki--well, he blushed several dangerous shades of red. Then stuttered nonsensical words, eyes wide...before he shut the folder and looked away. He actually muttered a curse word or two.  
  
Juri--always composed, seemed to freeze for a moment...as if she was not already a chilled personality to begin with. She shut the folder and crossed her arms, fixing Touga with a brief look of disdain.  
  
Saionji--now **his** reaction was priceless! A minute of pure shock that soon melted away to his usual seething anger...something Saionji rarely kept contained.  
  
"You get to teach Himemiya Anthy WHAT??!!" Saionji burst out, standing up quickly and his chair flying back to the ground.  
  
Touga just smiled before clearing his throat.  
"Not just her, Saionji...the whole campus is to be taught sexual education, to give them a better knowledge of their bodies and to know the dangers of promiscuity--like pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases. It is purely education."  
  
"Sure it is..." Juri chuckled lightly.  


--

[To Scatter the Shore]

Saionji wrote it down on his calender.  
He marked the date with a fat red circle of permanent marker.  
Friday of July.  
The 11th.  
Red to match his hair, red to match the heat, red to match some faraway horizon that would wilt over the ocean like...  
_...a rose, somehow, growing despite no water and no sun still just a weed among compost and still just a boy in the world of adult worries..._  
They met by chance.  
Saionji's dog ran away and a call came two days later.  
A man rode up the coast with Saionji's dog, talking into a cell-phone with too much wind in the background.  
And the dog was home, safe again. And a beer was offered and declined. And it was quiet, but Saionji just knew that it would not stay that way.  
Something about this man was loud, was disruptive, was like...  
_...like a playboy playing silly games with silly girls in a silly world, running along with gods and goddesses, pretending to be a prince when he was anything but, anything but that..._  
They had sex.  
And it was not transcendent. It was normal. And maybe a little more hectic than it should have been...considering how little they knew of each other.  
It was not passion. It was not lustful fire. Not really.  
Saionji felt like a shell, shattered by the sea and spread out over the sand...and Touga was the footprints of a million dancing girls...Touga was so smooth to touch.  
Saionji thought Touga might break.  
Touga thought, out loud in fact, that Saionji was too inexperienced.  
They did not sleep.  
They showered and Touga drove away and Saionji threw a bottle of amber-brown out onto the trash.  
The dog ran away again.  
Like dogs do...disappearing somewhere men cannot follow...to some land far far away, like Oz or like...  
_...over the rainbow and under cotton-candy skies is that place, that place that molded us this way and who remembers it now? who can see such deadly sweetness now in this darkened world of realness?_  


--

[Untitled]

When I awoke, a vast ocean churned by my ears. Tiny daggers of white dipping in and out of dark waters, rolling waves crashing against an iron hull. A man sat and watched me, looking very much like a sailor. His hair was as black as night and his skin a pale olive, with a faint scar under one eye--a smooth ivory cut.  
_from here you're haunting me_  
I think I murmured a name. I think I said it over and over until he clamped a warm hand over my lips. I do not know what he said to me...roughly sewn words thrust into my delicate brain, getting caught in a whirlpool of other voices, distant images..._to advance or not to advance-I hear you laughing_  
The sun rose over the world and I covered my eyes. The man left me there, retching into a bucket. With only the clothes on my back. On a tiny cot of dirty green. And, for moment, I think I see someone watching me from the shadows of this cabin.  
Watching. Waiting. Wondering.  
A flash of violet and I am sick once more.  
_only not to be of use-impossible_  


--

[Underneath]

At school, the words Kanae said seemed all too real. The plans for Summer, the idle chatter of boys and beauty swimming along with the knowledge that none of them--blonde, brunette, petite or tall--would fail a class.  
At school, the days at home became blurry. Kanae could not see them so well. They faded like the shore from the sea.   
But one touch...a hand on her shoulder in jest, a whisper against her ear from a friend...and her Mother came into sharp focus.  
It was as if she was there, standing in front of Kanae.  
Standing. Then stalking.  
Kanae would have to dig her nails into her wrist, to draw a bit of blood to shake the vision from her eyes.  
At night, Kanae dreamed of being carried away by a blizzard of the coldest snow. A wall of frozen white to shield her and to literally chill her insides.  
Then she could not feel her skin crawl. Or her heart begin to beat a little too quickly. Or her body tremble in pitiful dread of what might lay outside her bedroom door this night.  
Every night. All nights.  


--

[Recklessly Beautiful]

****

she's convinced  
At night, her dreams wander toward him.  
Standing like a tree. Over-shadowing her down below.  
And he is too magnificent. Too perfect. Too much for one body to contain. And she wants him, wants his power and his coolness and his angry passion.  
**she could hold back**  
His hair, a dark forest. His eyes, indigo stars. His skin, apple-white. How many evenings must she lay here--alone--and think upon him? How many memories must she create? To a life not even possible to live?  
**a glacier**  


--

[Tomorrow For Her]

When he thought about it, **if** he decided that it was a worthy thing to do with his time, Mitsuru would sit all day long at his office window.  
Staring at nothing.  
Not the gleaming skyscrapers. Not the rain clouds shoving away the sun. Not the rush of ant-like people down below.  
Mitsuru knew what he was looking at.  
The years gone by--almost like a physical scar that would never heal--lingered out of this room.  
They hovered in the air, they swam in the rivers, they slept in bed with him every night.  
White gashes. Red wounds. Burning lines across his chest.  
Of youth. Of loss. Of desperation. Of lust.  
_"I told her I would give up anything for her to love me. I would forget my past, leave my present behind...I would give up tomorrow for her."_  
She did not need his days. She did not need him.  
Mitsuru stares on until his phone rings.  


--

[Always Kept]

Like a package.  
All the corners smooth, all the edges sharp.  
Juri uncovered it one day, laying quiet in the attic of her mind. She brushed away the dust. She tore the paper in a cautious way.  
This was no holiday. This was no holiday.  
Her Mother's old locket, still shining gold.   
And her Father's shaving knife, the blade still able to cut.  
Juri knicked her finger.  
Her blood rose to the surface, a red dot slowly working into the grooves of her fingertip.  
She pulled out a photo. She saw herself cut out a circle. She saw herself open the locket and put something almost invisible in there.  
Juri shook, her arms wrapping around her body. Juri ran away from the dangerous gift in her soul.   
And she awoke, the next day, to a snow-drift outside her window. No school today. No way out of here today.  
A locket dangled from her doorknob.  


--

[As Usual]

It was June.  
And the streets were crowded, due to the heat. Everyone wanted out of their stuffy apartments or homes. Some ate ice cream. Some stood with their faces in front of a hose, cold water hitting waiting skin. Some waited for the day to end and for night to close in around them.  
It didn't matter.  
Days, hot or cold, did not matter much to Saionji. He smoked and leaned against a blank wall. Touga was outside, walking the edge of a stained sidewalk. You could hear the cars hum out there like large insects.  
Watching a meal crawl across the ground. Ready to feast.  
Touga brought them in. It was his face, his eyes--it sucked them all in. Then their faces would fall in bitter disappointment as he would push away their sticky fingers. Push them toward Saionji.  
And Saionji would fuck them. He did not know their names. Or hear their breathing. In his mind, Saionji was fucking Touga. Because Saionji hates him. Because Saionji loves him. Just because.  


--

[A Choice]

She thinks that it does not really matter what forces enter your life and make you decide to take the steps you do.  
Whether it is an illusionary world or limitless grief, lost love or familial agony...Once the ball is in your court, it is your decision alone.  
She made a choice, knowing it would not work. She moved her feet like a dead man walking. The end would not be a fairy tale.  
But it would be real. And to gain reality, she was ready to pick the less than perfect way to go.  


--

[Drifter]

A magazine flutters restlessly in the cool wind of the desert at night. She does not know why she keeps on buying them in the first place. It is a waste of money.  
Paris fashion, tiny waists and lipstick-shine upon heroin models.  
Kanae knew those girls. Once.  
She was one of them--a brief and dull memory of her tongue wrapping around a slice of something delicious, something tart. The taste lingered long after the food was consumed.   
It could have been a drug. Could have been a dream. Could have been a lot of things. She sleeps during the day, baking in the hot sun of some little town and beside a pool. The smell of chlorine fills her senses, lulling her back to another time and to a million other people.  
Of her mother. Of her dead father. Of a long-legged man.  
Kanae drives at night, using the stars to guide her. She does not know where she learned how to do that...but it works, it works all the time.  
Her map is in pieces. Her gas-tank is running low. Her simple dress is now forever dusty, carrying every place she has been in its folds.  
And she keeps on going. She cannot stop. Kanae never stops moving. Never stops.  


--

[The Price of Beauty]

The keys hit the floor with a rattle.  
And no lamp turned on tonight, as she walked into her bathroom and took out the slender knife.  
Monogrammed with a 'K' and a 'N'.  
She had cut her hair. She had trimmed her nails.  
She had removed the fat. She had poisoned the blemishes.  
And now, with Touga married...with all the other boys of her youth married or gay or long gone...Nanami decided that being alive was just a bore.

  
--

[Who We Settle For]

The room smelled so stale.  
But then, it always did...on this side of the street, in this section of the city. Like clothes packed away. Like memories stored in boxes. Like dust and molecules of the dead.  
And here is how it happened--Miki was reading one day, outside in a crisp Spring morning, drinking coffee. He was wearing a black coat that hit below his knees. He was turning the pages of a novel with numb fingers.  
And then someone sat down. And it was Saionji.  
Looking tired. Looking worn down. Looking older.  
Miki knew that his own image had not faded so much as grown wild.  
The hair longer. The eyes had lowered. The eyes of seduction instead of blissful innocence...they grazed over the man opposite in brief appraisal. It made Saionji uncomfortable.  
For a while.  
Not for long.  
Until they were talking about nothing, all the time just slipping information in-between the words spoken.  
It was all _Touga Touga Touga_ from Saionji's mouth, though the name was never really said.  
And Miki's eyes, those blue blue eyes, they told the story to the man..._we met again we have slept together we are not a couple but we are more of one than you could ever dream to be with him_  
Miki never made a choice with his lovers.  
He just let them do as they please and then got up in the morning, drew them upon stiff white paper and went home. But this time...Miki was the one in charge.  
Saionji wanted Touga.  
Miki wanted to play.  
So, in a stale room, they go. So, in a stale room, they consummate something that is not real.  
Miki has never been a top.  
It feels kind of good.  


--

[Holding On]

__

1387.  
1645.  
1902.  
I've seen you all over the world. I've walked by you on every street. I've felt your body next to me every night.  
The years have flown by and I am still holding on.  
_1429.  
1766.  
2056._  
I see our future merge with our past. I see your smile on the lips of children. I hear your voice in a crowded subway. You are everywhere and nowhere.   
And I am holding on, just telling myself that one day I will catch up to you.  


--

[Red-Stemmed Dogwoods]

Dreams never happened to her, not since she was a child...a million years ago, at least. But tonight, with a pitiful excuse for a savior in slumber beside her, Anthy walked down the hallways of that illusionary Sandman.  
She could feel the very grains of time dig into her bare feet.  
And along the walls, dying wisteria.  
And like fingers threaded, sunburned ivy on the ceiling.  
And red-stemmed dogwoods, the limbs thin and pulsing like veins, one by one...cut down...like gorgeous whips...  
Anthy wondered, for a moment, if this was a sign of the pain to come.  


--

[The Instincts of a Child]

No one can claim to have become an adult.  
Chasing the long and tall shadows of their parents, into the blinding white light of the world.  
The world of being older.  
The world of knowledge that went beyond books.  
But Mikage cannot remember his mother--_whiteasafeathersoftaspetalsvaguelikeaghostrunningfalling_  
And he cannot remember his father--_statueofstonepiercingeyescoarsecoatcoldskinlockedawaylockedaway_  
Mikage stands on the top of this tower.  
And down below, way down below, buried in ground...is his coffin.  
It is rotten with sweet and sickly dreams of youth.  
The core is hollow with candy-coated notions.  
And all the flowers are black, the colors washed away with childish naivete.  


----

TBC  



End file.
